


Fraud, Scandal, and Farce

by oleanderhoney



Series: The Colour of Light [7]
Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: ASiB redone, Christmas!, F/M, Mycroft can be a bastard at times, Purple Shirt of Sex, Victor Trevor - Freeform, trademarked, yay tragic back stories!
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-05-22
Updated: 2015-12-13
Packaged: 2018-01-26 04:33:21
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 12
Words: 42,065
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1674830
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/oleanderhoney/pseuds/oleanderhoney
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Moriarty has run aground. Meanwhile, there is a scandal brewing, and Sherlock's past comes back to haunt him. A retelling of ASiB in which John Watson, is in fact, Jane Watson.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. A Purple Shirt, and Minced Words

**Author's Note:**

> Hello! Oh my goodness. Here we are once more unto the breach, my friends. If you have followed Jane and Sherlock from the start you have my sincerest thanks because they would not have made it this far without your enthusiasm. You guys keep me right. It's always you. I love you all and I hope you like what I have in store for you.
> 
> xxHoney
> 
> PS: If you are enjoying the genderbent Watson trope, you guys should check out the lovely LadyLaran and her [A Study in Partnership](http://archiveofourown.org/works/1148620/chapters/2327390) as well as my other good friend Paralelsky and her fic [A Study in Alternatives](http://archiveofourown.org/works/321823/chapters/517761). They both tickle my fancy, and both of the writers have been a huge support through out this series.
> 
> PPS: I should probably mention that I do not own Sherlock or its affiliate characters from the BBC and rights are reserved to the almighty Mofftiss, amen.

* * *

_Purple._

Not just any purple, though. No, it is the colour of dusk upon the moors; the corona of the sun through a haze of wood smoke; the taste of the last dregs of whiskey at the bottom of a shot glass; a shade lighter than aubergine but darker than violet. It looks like jazz sounded — svelte and sultry like bassoon, and under the right light, it moves in a way that reminds her of ice slowly melting in a tumbler made of crystal. In a word; the shirt is Sherlock personified. When she looks at the price tag, she’s not surprised in the slightest by how obnoxiously expensive it is; and the sheer audacity is just as fitting.

It is for precisely these reasons that Jane plucks it off the rack at Liberty’s, and heads for the checkout.

Granted, _Dolce and Gabbana_ is a bit out of her price range, but from the moment she saw it in the shop window, she knew she couldn’t _not_ get it.

The simple fact that her brain suddenly decided to remember how to process the bloody colour purple _now_ is practically clandestine, especially with Christmas around the corner. That, and she felt particularly awful about accidentally ruining his favourite pearl-grey one on account a pair of her…more colourful underwear stowing away in the wash, irrevocably staining the expensive fabric with streaks of (what she assumed were) pink, given the look of horror on Sherlock’s face. At first, she didn’t know what the problem was, her partial blindness to colour preventing her from really seeing the damage, but when Sherlock pulled the culprit free of the drum and showed her the incriminating ‘Monday’ stamped on the rear, she knew exactly what had happened seeing as how that particular pair of pants was indeed [bright red.](http://archiveofourown.org/works/914021/chapters/3893509)

Just thinking about it makes her chuckle to herself, and in good spirits she pulls out her wallet.

“Do you gift wrap?” she asks cheerily.

“Of course. It’s complimentary with purchase,” the woman behind the counter says, and gestures to two rolls of paper behind her. “Christmas trees, or reindeer?”

She goes to answer, but stops when something catches her eye.

There, atop a pillar across from her, is a security camera. One which she could have sworn was pointing the opposite direction only a moment ago, but is now suspiciously trained on her.

Her good mood curdles, and she purses her lips. _Bloody Mycroft._

The camera blinks and adjusts more squarely on her position, and she has to actively refrain from flipping it off.

“Miss?” the shop clerk says, snapping her back to the present. “Do you have a preference?” She indicates the paper again.

“Er…trees, I guess. That’s fine,” Jane says with a strained smile.

After the shirt is boxed up and wrapped, she makes her way out of Liberty’s, scowling when she catches the camera tracking her in her peripheral.

She turns left instead of right, ducking into an obscure alley to try an avoid the All Seeing Eye of the insufferable British Government, and smiles to herself when she pops out onto a lesser known road. If what Sherlock taught her was correct, she only had to travel five blocks west before she reached a main road where she could hopefully hail a cab.

She only makes it three however, when a familiar black car with tinted windows pulls up along side her.

Jane grits her teeth, but otherwise keeps walking.

The window rolls down, and she nearly snarls, “You can tell your boss to _piss off.”_

“Now, now, Jane. Let’s be reasonable. I merely intend on giving you a ride back to your flat,” the man himself calls from the car. This makes her stop in her tracks, momentarily surprised it's actually Mycroft and not his PA, Athos, or whatever he was calling himself these days.

“What, no warehouse? Abandoned factory?” Jane says, mood continuing to deteriorate.

“I’m afraid I do not have time for our normal rendezvous,” Mycroft says with a blasé wave of his hand. He doesn’t even look up from the file in his lap when he pops the door open for her. “Now if you would be so kind…”

“I think not, Mycroft,” Jane says and straightens up to her full height, intent on marching away.

“I wouldn’t require this if you would’ve only agreed to meet me at my office like I had first requested yesterday.”

“More like threatened,” Jane says, lip curling back into a sneer of disdain. She does get into the car, however, seeing as how it's likely he won't bloody stop until she complies. She closes the door, and Mycroft raps on the glass partition. The car takes off down the road, and Jane crosses her arms defensively in front of her chest, not deigning to look at Mycroft sat next to her.

“Doing some Christmas shopping?” Mycroft says in his insouciant tones. He prods the carrier bag at her feet with the tip of his umbrella. Jane wrinkles her nose.

“I highly doubt you abducted me for idle small talk, Mycroft,” she says. “Get to the point, or let me out.”

“I can see you have been picking up on my brother’s recalcitrance. How delightful,” he says sourly. “How is the leg healing up?”

“Fine. Haven’t needed the cane in weeks. Sherlock’s also fine, by the way,” she clips.

“Yes, I assumed so.”

“Oh, good. Because your radio silence, although refreshing, is a bit ill-timed given the fact your brother was nearly blown to bits by a madman with a disturbing hard-on for him.” Jane can feel her face heat along with her boiling temper. There was always something about Mycroft that shortened her fuse.

“He is, as you say, fine,” Mycroft replies with a caviler shrug.

“You’ve been gone for months! Of all the times you’ve interfered with his life, why stop now especially when he needs you the most?”

He fixes her with a mildly amused look. One that says, _‘Aren’t you one to talk?’_ It causes a hard lump of something unpleasant to settle in the pit of her stomach. Like guilt.

“That was different.”

“Was it, now? Because from where I am sitting, it looks like a veritable exit strategy,” he says, lips thinning into a false grin.

“What are you talking about?” Jane says, raising her chin.

“Your record when it comes to emotional entanglements, romantic or otherwise, has been less than stellar,” Mycroft says, sharp eyes boring into hers.

Jane has to close her eyes in order to get a handle on her temper. “Mycroft…I swear to god. If you are poking around in my private therapy sessions again…”

“Trust issues,” he says stridently, pulling out that hateful, _hateful_ steno pad of his. “pesky things, aren’t they? The problem is, they end up taking everybody down with the ship in the end. Wouldn’t you agree? Best get out now while you can.”

“Listen,” she barks, finger jabbing in his direction. “Sherlock isn’t an _'entanglement'_ to me. He is much, much more than that, and if you could only open your eyes for a change, you would realise that the reason I left in the first place was because I lo —”

 _“Don’t say it,”_ he says, snapping the pad shut. His eyes are livid with anger even though the rest of him remains the picture of regal composure. It’s actually quite terrifying, and she is reminded of the fact that this isn’t just her best friend’s overbearing brother, but in fact, one of the most powerful men in England, and can probably have her disappeared six ways to Sunday. It’s enough to startle her out of her tirade.

“You mistake me,” he starts again, tone as smooth as silk with a deceptive cutting-edge that makes her spine rigid and holds her to attention, “I am well aware of what my brother means to you, Dr. Watson, and under any other circumstances your fealty and devotion would be admirable.”

“But?” she says, an iciness cresting over her. She doesn’t like where this is headed one bit, and she attempts to brace herself.

“But, these are not the normal circumstances,” he says. “Simply put: I agree that you leaving like you did was for the best for all involved. What I don’t agree with is the fact that you came back.”

“I’m sorry, what? You _want_ me to leave?” Jane says, confused. She was certain she was headed for the Obligatory Elder Brother Chat. This is…unexpected, and leaves here ill-footed.

“Like I said, you’ve managed to tear the plaster off in one go so to speak, and now that this ridiculous co-dependency between you two has lessened in its intensity, you both can get on with your separate lives.”

“Co-dependency?” Jane says dumbly. She can do nothing but repeat him as the horror of his words penetrate her. Apparently, she isn't mishearing him, and the reality of what he iss saying makes her cold. God, he's _serious._ If there's anyone who can render her and Sherlock apart, it would be Mycroft Holmes.

“He gave you a reason to cope when you got back from the war, and in turn you distracted him from his more…recreational activities. For that, you have my utmost gratitude. But, there is a season for everything, as they say, and I am afraid your partnership with Sherlock Holmes is drawing to a close,” Mycroft continues on in that aggravating business-like tone. It’s becoming hard to breathe in the car, and Jane’s head starts spinning.

“This isn’t some transaction between us, Mycroft. It doesn’t work like that,” she says hoarsely.

“Oh? Did you really think you and Sherlock would carry on they way you are indefinitely?” Jane presses her lips into a thin line, her silence as loud as any answer, and Mycroft smirks. “Come now, dear girl. This is my brother we are talking about. You are the type to want to settle down eventually. Once this perverse addiction for danger runs its course, you will inevitably seek out some form of stability. Sherlock will never be able to give you what you want in the end.”

She blinks at him. Almost laughs. _Is_ that _what this is about?_

“You have no idea what I want,” she says, gaining a little of her courage back. It was always difficult to keep her footing with the Holmeses, given the fact they were able to see right through you like water at a moments glance. But for the first time, Mycroft is dead wrong about her, and it's bloody refreshing. “You think you have me pegged, but you couldn’t be farther from the mark. Where is all of this coming from anyway? Not too long ago you were trying to pay me in order to get close to him, now you’re what? Threatening me so I will leave? What’s going on, and for the love of god, be direct. I have no bloody patience for your minced words and bloody mental chess.”

Mycroft scrutinises her with a lilt of his eyebrows, reading the tenacity in her posture, and the challenge in her eye.

“Very well,” he says, the amused smirk fading into something dangerous. He takes a short breath and unleashes a torrent, double barrels loaded. “You, Jane Watson, are a danger to him, plain and simple; a weak point serving only to be manipulated in order to force Sherlock’s hand. You want to know where I’ve been? I’ve been trying to clean up the mess you’ve created from the fall out of the Bruce Partington fiasco, and in doing so I’ve owed people _favours._ It’s because of you that Sherlock’s future is no longer secure despite all I’ve done to make it so.”

“My fault?” she says, gritting her teeth. “How do you figure?”

“You’ve single handedly done what no one has been able to, and have infected the core of him like one would if they were a virus.” The words, coated in vitriol, are like a slap to the face, and she blinks her astonishment. Mycroft presses on. “Furthermore, you’ve pried off his armour, and have left him to the destruction of others as well as himself, and this. _This._ Is what is the most dangerous of all. There have been many times where he has been right on the verge of destroying himself, and if you continue on, you will be actively giving him a tangible catalyst to self-implode if this thing between you doesn’t work.” He pulls a breath in through his nose, checking himself. This is as emotional as Jane's ever seen him, and she would probably be more concerned if she weren’t so blisteringly angry. He parts his lips in a moue of distaste, his diatribe simmering under a veil of barely contained antipathy.

“There was once a time where I thought you could be the making of my brother, but in light of recent events, I am convinced you make him worse than ever. And if you genuinely _care,”_ he spits the word out as if it were something foul, “for him, then this wouldn’t come as a surprise to you, and you would do as I ask and leave him now before it becomes even more impossible for you both.”

Silence resounds between them, and Jane’s heart clatters against her breast bone as her rage winds itself tight around her spine. She has to focus on breathing so she doesn’t succumb to the violence waiting to be unleashed within her. 

_How dare he? How_ dare _he?_

“Jesus. No wonder he thinks he’s a sociopath. _You_ taught him to embrace the fact!” she says, shaking.

“I taught him how to keep himself safe,” Mycroft corrects in razor tones. “And now there is only one thing threatening all I’ve done to keep my brother out of the proverbial fire, and it happens to be you.”

“Why all this, then?” she says, a realisation hitting her. “Why not just have me ‘relocated?’” Mycroft’s gaze slithers away at this, a minor tell, and he stares at the partition in front of him. “Oh. I see. You can’t just get rid of me because then it would be _your_ fault and Sherlock would never forgive you. That’s why you are asking me to do it.”

“If you are capable of setting aside your baser emotions, you would agree that this is the most tactical solution.”

“Bollocks! Don’t give me that shite about tactical solutions and exit strategies. Christ. No wonder he can’t stand the sight of you with the way to talk down to all of us peasants as if we are but cogs in a machine.”

“Yes well, when one is busy running the country, one does not have time to entertain notions of congeniality. Especially if one is too busy looking out for those with an automatic target on their backs simply because they are connected to me in the first place. Sherlock is, and always will be, a liability as long as I hold the position I do in the government. And the last thing I need is for some common Army doctor to come around and ruin everything,” Mycroft clips.

“If you honestly think I have that much influence, then you obviously aren’t as smart as you claim,” Jane says, balling her fists up in order to stop herself from decking the bastard. “You are also forgetting the fact that I would do anything to protect him just as much as you, and if I haven’t proven to you just how dangerous it is to underestimate me by now, then you really are dumber than I thought.”

Mycroft huffs bitterly through his nose, realising finally that Jane isn't going to budge. “Bravery of the soldier. Of course, I still maintain bravery and stupidity are synonymous.” 

“If you want me gone, you are going to have to do it yourself because I’m not going anywhere unless Sherlock tells me otherwise,” Jane says, ignoring the barb. “Now let. me. _out.”_

“You are making a mistake,” Mycroft says as the car slows to a stop, and Jane zips up her collar as more of a protective armour than to block out the chill.

“No, Mycroft,” she says, glaring at him. “the mistake was leaving for as long as I did in the first place.”

Before she has a chance to reach for the door, Mycroft’s hand clamps around her wrist like a vice.

“My brother has the brain of a scientist and a philosopher, and yet he elects to be a detective. What then, Dr. Watson, can we deduce about his heart?” There is a trace of pleading in his eyes as if he had been pondering this question all his life, and for some reason it causes Jane's breath to catch oddly in her throat.

“I – I don’t know,” she says.

Mycroft sighs and lets her go. “Neither do I,” he says, defeated. “But what ever the case, his heart is solely in your hands now. I hope you realise the gravity of this, Jane. I really hope you do. For his sake, and yours.”

Jane frowns at him, a tightness cinching her chest at the threat. She goes to say something else, but words abandon her at Mycroft’s unusually candid expression. It is one of burning intensity; something ferrous and sharp lingering underneath.

It isn’t until after the car drives away when she places that hidden, unfamiliar shadow in Mycroft’s eyes: fear.

Jane doesn’t know what to make of it, only that it leaves her feeling cold and bereft despite the cheer in the air around her – fairy lights already starting to go up on street corners, and the usual warmth of the holidays lighting up the people passing by. It was surreal, the car ride having felt like an alternate reality in of itself, a nightmare amidst all the gladness.

She sets off walking in the direction of Baker Street, rolling her shoulders and clutching the carrier bag tightly in her fist in order to dissipate the remaining unease.

She tries her hardest not to let his words get to her, she really does, but she can’t help but parse through the threats, reflecting one of her deepest fears back to her. 

_No matter what Sherlock may think, they are more vulnerable together than apart._

Damn Mycroft for sowing seeds of doubt right when she felt like things were finally falling into place. After so many months of ambivalence and heartache, after slowly rebuilding the bond between them, now everything is once again thrown arseways to the breeze.

She can't ignore the kernel of truth Mycroft presented to her: it was easy for someone to use her to get to Sherlock. The disaster at the pool is proof of that, and the fact that Moriarty is still in the wind causes her stomach to clench unpleasantly at the thought.

But leave Sherlock? Leave the whirlwind of cases, and danger, and impromptu violin concerts at four in the morning, and adventure, and her amazing genius with his enigmatic smile and dark humour? They've tried to distance themselves once before and it didn't work. Just thinking about it is enough to make her ill.

Would she do it if it came down to it? — is the question.

It causes her to come up short and her heart to flutter.

Would she if it meant keeping Sherlock alive?

Yes. No question about it.

That line of thought is another thought that did strange, twisty things to her gut, and she resolutely pushed it to the back of her mind. Hopefully that is a bridge she would never have to cross.

She takes a cleansing breath and turns the corner onto Baker Street, already feeling more at ease with the familiar awning of Speedy’s Café coming into view.

The windows of 221B right above the café are merrily lit, beckoning her to the warmth and comfort inside, and she speeds up her walking.

Yes, she will definitely worry about all that later.

For now, the strains of a violin are wafting through the open window, calling her back to where she belongs. Where, in her heart, she’s always belonged.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> * Link for After's is updated! And like always, when you see a bolded word be on the look out, lovelies!
> 
> _**Edited 22/05/2016_


	2. Adagio

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It was the same every time he closed his eyes.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello my loves! So the second chapter funk has been thwarted! For some reason the second chapter when ever I start a new installment is always one that just drags for me. Anyways. I hope you like it, and thank you for being patient with me! xxHoney.
> 
> *Links updated!

* * *

It was the same, always the same, every time he closed his eyes.

_The pool, the lights, Moriarty and his crooked grin like cracked porcelain —_

_and Jane_

_dead, blank and staring, a bullet hole right between her eyes_

_or in the chest_

_that manic laugh ricocheting off the tiled walls._

_“I will burn you. I will burn…the_ heart… _out of you…”_

And he was always too late to stop it. Of course, if it wasn’t the snipers, his brain would torture him in coming up with a million different scenarios in which the explosion managed to kill her leaving him unharmed (typical ) as he watched fire and rubble consume her over and over and over until he managed to wake himself up, the sweat causing his cotton shirt to cling unpleasantly to his chest and back. It was like some bloody Sisyphean curse.

It was ironic, really, that something like this would jump start him into dreaming after nearly a decade of going without even a flicker. It was as if his defunct brain was playing catch up by cobbling together hundreds of these scenarios within the course of one night.

It was entirely _loathsome._

Like now for instance, when he jolts awake on the sofa trembling, his ears still ringing from the phantom gunshots and explosions, and mentally he calculates the number twenty-three. 

23\. 

Twenty-three ways in which Jane dies. Six from the snipers, three in a heart and head respectively; ten in the explosion; three found her drowned in the pool; three at Moriarty’s own hand; and one — one at his own when he was made to shoot her himself. That was the most chilling of them all, in the end, and his stomach lurches at the memory.

The good thing about his genius, however, is the fact that even in the throes of a vivid nightmare, his logic is never too far away, so it only takes a second for Sherlock to shake off the oily dread clinging to his skin, and find footing in the tangible reality all around him. He flings himself up to a sitting position, scrubbing his hands through his tangled hair, giving it a sharp tug for good measure just to ground him.

His face is still sweaty, (loathsome; ridiculous) and he makes his way to the bathroom so he could dunk his head under the tap. The water is freezing, and sluices under the collar of his slightly rumpled dress shirt and down his back when he straightens up, waking him even further. He gasps, hands braced on either side of the wash basin, and he glares at his reflection in the mirror.

In a word, he looks dreadful.

Pale, severe face, dark circles, hair soaking wet and plastered to his forehead. He grimaces, and grabs his blue dressing gown from the back of the door, tugging it over his lanky frame. He slicks a hand through his curls, brushing the fringe off his forehead, and stomps back out towards the main room.

Distraction. He _needs_ a distraction.

He pauses in the kitchen for a moment, eyes roaming over the contents of the table hoping to find something to do before he remembers all of his current experiments are in various points of stasis for now, and he was still waiting to hear back from Molly about that cirrhotic liver.

He stands in the middle of the sitting room, eyes tracking aimlessly over the walls where his collages are usually tacked when he is working on a case. There are still snippets of the Burks case taped to the mirror that Jane made him leave up so she can type up the details in the blog later. He wonders what the next latest and greatest title is going to be. The Cracked Chiropractor? Abhorrent [Adjustment?](http://archiveofourown.org/works/914021/chapters/4460157) M-alignment Murderer? (Preposterous.) He snorts despite himself, and deep down he admits that this whole title-lark is actually the tiniest bit entertaining. (But that is something he will take to his grave most earnestly if he can help it.)

He sighs morosely, gaze lighting on the skull on the mantle. The hollow eye-sockets stare back at him balefully as if sharing in the misery of his black mood.

“I don’t know why you’re so upset; you’re the dead one, remember?” Sherlock says, and plucks the skull off of its perch. The skull glares back at him as if telling him to do something about their sorry states.

Sherlock curls his lip in a sneer. “I suppose I am made to placate you, then? Like usual.” If the skull had eyelids, Sherlock is certain it would entertain him with a dull blink. “Quiet, you.”

He makes his way over to the sofa, and flops down in a slouch that would have his mother cringing at its indignity, propping his feet up on the coffee table in a move that would most definitely earn him the title of ‘philistine’. He puts the skull on the top of his knees and engages in a futile staring competition.

_Wanna play chess?_

“You were always terrible at chess.”

_Ah, I always let you win, mon ami._

“And your French accent is still appalling.”

_And you’re still cracked, mate._

Sherlock wants to retort, when he realises that doing just that would prove him right. (And that the ‘him’ in question was an inanimate skull.) He sighs, frowning. It had been a long time since Sherlock had heard his voice inside his head. Since before Jane, anyway. The thought gives him pause.

He picks the skull up and cradles it in his hands for a moment before turning it over. His fingers trace around the hollow at the base (the foramen magnum) for a moment before dipping two of them inside the empty space. He finds what he is looking for, and after gripping it between his fingertips, he pulls out a cool glass phial stoppered at the end with a rubber cork. Inside the phial is grey ash, and Sherlock tilts it back and forth, observing some of the coarser particles fire couldn’t completely disintegrate. He shakes it a little, the sound of leftover bone fragments ticking against the sides of the glass tube, before clutching it tightly in his hand. He looks down at his lap.

Without the phial, the skull is just a skull, not even real in the end. Just a really, _really_ good replica. A farce. He sets the grinning thing on the coffee table, and leans back into the couch again, rolling the ashes methodically between his palms.

_Ash._

Doesn’t he have enough to say about ash? Yes. He’s written entire monographs on the properties of ash, and he could probably fill libraries on the topic. It would be his version of waxing poetic [on the architecture of the column.](http://archiveofourown.org/works/914021/chapters/4620105)

_A lot of people don’t realise the beauty in the classical order. The Greco-Roman influence can be found all around us, and people pass it by every day. Take Old Bailey for instance. Classic Ionic columns with traditional scrolls at their capital. They look simple enough, but they have a large base. They are unyielding. Like the law in most respects._

“I thought you didn’t want to be an architect? Not really. I thought you were just doing that to piss off your father.”

_Yeah well I loved whatever made him livid, so it’s no wonder I fell in love with the very thing he despised; creativity and art and anything that was the opposite of investments, and capitol gain. And passion, especially passion. That’s why I recruited you almost instantly to be my best mate. You’re a right wanker, and driven, and don’t give a rat’s arse what people think._

Sherlock snorts at this. “If I remember correctly, it was your dog that did the recruiting. If you can even call it that.”

The memory of his laughter — robust and burnished bright like copper, echoes in Sherlock’s head, and the sound brings a tentative smile to his lips.

_You’re my best mate, Sherlock._

The smile falls off his face. “That never did you any good, did it Victor?” he whispers. 

He reaches for the skull again and tucks the phial back where it belongs, making sure it is wedged just so behind the mandible so as to not come loose. He rises to his feet again, and places the skull back on the mantle.

His fingertips linger over the cranium for a moment more, before his arm drops back down to his side.

He was an idiot.

Best mate — Best Friend with a capital ‘F.’ _Partner._ (Paramour?) These were the terms Jane used to describe what they had, and he managed to forget for a while what those particular titles really meant for people like him. He apparently managed to delete the fact that people _like him_ didn’t have best mates for a reason.

And what was even more infuriating, he especially managed to forget and push aside the only sage advice Mycroft has ever given him about getting involved. About caring. And now — now here he was. Torn between wanting Jane, and being absolutely terrified of what that actually meant for the both of them. Because its not something he can just ignore any longer. He is _involved._ It’s not something that he can just lock up in a room in his Mind Palace. The fact of the matter is front and centre, forcing him to confront it head on.

How many times did he believe he was doing the right thing with Jane? It was obvious when it came to Moriarty’s games that they were better off united than apart. It was true they could be used against one another, but Sherlock wholeheartedly believed he was clever enough in order to stay one step ahead. If Moriarty expected Sherlock to come to this conclusion, (which he did) then obviously his goal was to drive them apart for one reason or another. So clearly it was more logical to do the opposite and stay together at all costs. Granted, they barely escaped with their lives the last time, but with that fact notwithstanding, they wouldn’t have been so compromised in the first place had they not split up to begin with.

Sherlock drags his fingers through his hair and tries to dispel the sudden voice in the back of his head (that sounds an awful lot like Mycroft) telling him that he was reaching at this point. Scrambling for purchase, and subsequently in denial.

_‘Caring is not an advantage.’_

Sherlock whips around and marches over to the desk where his violin is resting in its open case. He pulls it out and tightens his bow, intent on drowning out the infuriating mosquito buzzing around in his head with its stupid umbrella wielding ways and its propensity to always make him second guess himself. 

He pulls the notes from the strings as if drawing poison from a wound, and tries as best as he can to lose himself to the metre that is three-four time, subsumed by _adagio_ and _mezzo forte._

If only for a little while.

* * *

Jane makes it halfway up to the flat when she realises something is off. Usually Sherlock hears the street door, and does one of two things: 1) he bellows throughout the flat for either her or Mrs. Hudson — and if it’s for Mrs. Hudson it’s actually for her anyway just so Jane will pay attention to him and tell him to stop his hollering, or 2) his violin playing will devolve into a tortured shrieking, because Sherlock only plays decently to those he deems are privy. Which is hardly anyone.

So when Jane hears the strains of a beautiful, yet haunting melody, she stops on the landing to listen. It sounds somewhat familiar, but she knows it’s nothing she’s heard before, and after adjusting the shopping more securely in her hands, she makes her way up the remaining stairs.

The violin only ceases when she lingers in the doorway of the sitting room.

“Jane,” Sherlock says, bow still poised over the strings. His back is to her like it normally is when he plays, preferring to look out the window because it helps him think.

“A case, then?” Jane assumes when he starts back up. He doesn’t answer, which is normal, however Jane doesn’t move from her spot. There is something about his posture that gives her pause. He looks beaten. Exhausted surely, but a different sort of weariness that she’s seen only on a few occasions. She tries to place it, eyes scanning throughout the flat for anything amiss. She almost misses it, but at the last second she catches sight of the mantle. The skull is there like always, but she could have sworn it was facing the kitchen earlier. She thinks Sherlock’s skills must be rubbing of on her for having noticed, and now she can recognise the piece he’s playing by the cadence. It’s Bach, she’s sure of it, and suddenly, it all makes sense.

She doesn’t know what, precisely, Victor Trevor has to do with Sherlock’s skull, and she doesn’t ask. But lately he’s been drawing in on himself, caught up in a certain tragic nostalgia that her knowledge of is tenuous at best.

All she knows is that Sherlock did have a friend once. Someone who was obviously very dear to him. And when that someone was gone, it scared Sherlock off of companionship for nearly a decade. Really, there were only two things she needed to know to draw her own conclusions. One, that his death had been a shock — Sherlock was the one to find him after his suspicions lead him to try and prevent Victor's suicide just a little too late. And two, Sherlock blamed himself for this through and through.

She doesn’t ask because it isn’t her place to pry into things she has no right prying into, but she pays especial care to Sherlock’s subtle shifts in mood, trying as hard as she can to catch him before he hits the bottom.

The brief croak of the bow as it is pressed just a little too hard into the string is what has Jane abandoning her position (sod the bloody milk for now) and closing the distance between them. She knows this sound well; it is one of a fettered desperation just under the surface of that stoicism, apparent only by the fatigue in his wrists as he continues to play and play and play — until the pain manifests into something physical he could actually deal with, instead of the hateful abstract of pain in his chest.

She’s not sure if he knows that’s what he’s doing in the end, but Jane never fails to recognise the cracks in his carefully layered exterior.

“Will you stop for a moment, Sherlock?” she asks, her voice low and soft. She breaches the chasm even more by placing her hand over the back of his shoulder.

The note stutters to a stop, and he lowers the instrument to hang loosely by his side. He bows his head, and sighs wearily.

“What is it?” he says, the usual sharpness dulled due to resignation. He won’t meet her gaze, but that’s all right. 

Instead, she does what she always does and tugs the violin from his slackening grasp so she can put it and the bow back safely in the case. He lets her, pressing his forehead against the window while she flicks the brass latches closed. When she's done, she looks at him and hesitates. 

What she really wants to do is smooth her palms over his broad shoulders to ease the tense muscles, and place a tender kiss on the back of his neck just where the hair curls at the top of his collar -- but she’s been ill-footed ever since she came back, not sure where the boundaries between them were anymore. Ever since the Pool Fiasco, they had been treading carefully around each other, giving each other space and reaffirming their bond as friends before anything else.

She takes a breath and does the next best thing, which is tugging at Sherlock’s wrist until he turns around and looks at her with his shifting blue/green eyes.

“All right?” she murmurs, pulling him a little closer. He nods woodenly, and allows her to tug him into an embrace. After a moment of unyielding tension, he breathes out and all but melts into her, face burrowing into the crook of her neck. She smiles, and brings her hands up to cradle his skull, twining her fingers gently in his disheveled hair that's still damp in some places. She can tell he hasn’t been sleeping well, and she’s not surprised. She traces little whorls into his scalp, feeling him relax even further. “Better?”

“Yes, I’m — I’m fine,” Sherlock says, pulling back after a moment. He clears his throat, an embarrassed flush tinting his cheeks. Jane turns away from him, giving him a moment of privacy. She goes into the kitchen to turn on the kettle same as she always does, taking solace in the familiar routine.

“You went shopping,” Sherlock remarks from the sitting room. Jane can hear the plastic rustle of the carrier bags, and she suddenly remembers the shirt she bought from Liberty’s.

“Wait!” she says, running out just in time to see Sherlock regarding the box wrapped in festive paper with a shiny foil bow on the centre. He has one finger tucked under the folded corner, poised to tear it apart. “Don’t you even dare, Sherlock Holmes.”

“Why not?” he says, eyes lighting up, devious. “It’s obviously for me seeing as how you wouldn’t have bothered to wrap it before coming home. So it’s meant to be secret, then. Not for Mrs. Hudson, no. You like to be thorough, and haven’t had the chance to ask her what she wants, and you, ever so intentional Jane, don’t want waste time getting people useless trinkets that will end up in a charity shop come February.” Jane rolls her eyes at the rapid deductions, but it’s halfhearted. The truth is, she would rather have him be an annoying rambly-dick than that remote, withdrawn figure from a moment ago.

“A secret, exactly. Now give it here,” she says trying to sound disapproving.

“So it is for me,” Sherlock says, holding her at bay with a palm on her collar bone as he lifts the box up higher, narrowing his eyes as if that would activate some sort of latent x-ray ability. He’s certainly intent in his scrutiny, as if scowling hard enough would help him see the contents just beyond the dancing Christmas trees and boughs of holly.

“ _Yes,_ you prat. But it’s for Christmas, and you can’t open it until then,” Jane says and swipes it from him.

“Oh dull. What’s the point in waiting for a specific day to open a gift? Holidays are rubbish, full of obligatory ‘get-togethers’ and false overall fond… _ness.”_ He says the word with a crinkle of his nose.

“You’re just throwing a strop because crime is usually down during this time of year.”

“Don’t remind me,” he bemoans, and plucks the parcel from her again, holding it high over her head where she can’t reach.

“It’s your fault. There’s been loads of perfectly good clients you’ve turned down,” she huffs, standing on tip-toes to try and snatch the present to no avail.

“What, you mean the little girls and their missing granddad we had yesterday?”

“That, and the poor sod found in Southwark,” Jane rejoins.

“I didn’t have enough data for that one, I told you,” Sherlock says, gritting his teeth.

“No,” Jane says, “you’re just pissy you couldn’t figure it out, and in light of — what did you call it? — the ‘absurd happenstance’ of the case, to work on it any further would only be a ‘detriment of fine superior brain power.’”

“The whole thing was a circus act! The plane tickets; the special first class biscuits; the fact he was stuffed in the car boot in his Sunday best. Ridiculous. I have far better things to occupy my time with. He wasn’t even _murdered_ for chrissake.”

“Yeah but he was supposed to die in that plane crash in Düsseldorf!” Jane exclaims. “Don’t you have _any_ theories?”

Sherlock glares at her before shaking the present he was holding. “I have a few _theories_ about what’s inside this box.”

“Oh come on, Sherlock. Don’t spoil it!” Jane says.

“It’s a shirt.”

Jane flares her nostrils. “Stop guessing,” she says, and whacks the crease of his arm so he’ll drop the present once and for all.

“I never guess,” he pouts, rubbing the inside of his elbow. “I know it’s a shirt.”

“No, you don’t,” she says obstinately. She holds it close to her chest, trying to hide her disappointment.

“Jane,” he says, giving her a _‘be serious, of course I know what’s in the box I’m the best detective in London’_ sort of look. She purses her lips. “Jane.”

“So what if you’re right? You’re not opening it until Christmas.” She walks over and props it tauntingly on the desk.

“But I know what it is already!” Sherlock says.

“Doesn’t matter. You’re not getting it until Christmas. And I _will_ know if you try to open it behind my back,” she says, whirling around and pushing him away from the desk.

“What do you expect me to do? It’s just sitting there mocking me!” Sherlock says. “You know as well as I do I am not responsible for my actions when I'm bored.” He crosses his arms haughtily.

Jane goes to retort when an idea suddenly hits her. She makes her way over to the mantle. “You’re bored, are you?”

“Horrendously so.”

“In that case, you shouldn’t have any qualms about —” She doesn’t get to finish, when Sherlock stridently cuts her off.

“No! We are _not_ doing that!” he nearly shouts when Jane retrieves a pair of theatre tickets from the utility knife pinned to the wood that served as their placeholder for various correspondence.

“Oh yes we are. Tonight’s the last night, and thanks to Angelo, these are redeemable anytime as long as the show is running. Waste not, want not,” she says grabbing her jacket again.

“Well, I happen to 'want not.' Go without me,” Sherlock says, shooing her with his hand.

“Ah, no. Last time I left you alone when you were like this you shot up the walls, and then blew up the flat,” she says, tossing him his greatcoat.

“ _That_ was not my fault,” Sherlock says indignantly, but shrugs on his Belstaff all the same. He mutters darkly under his breath, but allows her to lead them out to the pavement where they set off in the direction of finding a cab. She can tell his black mood is really just for show at this point, and that he’s actually grateful for an excuse to get out of the flat.

He doesn’t have to say anything, but when his hand finds its way into hers, Jane can’t help but smile a little when he squeezes it in gratitude.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yay Chapter two! Be on the look out for the bolded words to show up in 'Afters' as usual! The piece that Sherlock plays in the chapter is a Bach Goldberg Variation No. 25. It is beautiful.
> 
> I also have a [submit box](http://oleanderhoney.tumblr.com/submit/) on my tumblr now you you guys can sent me request and other stuff! Love you all!


	3. Breaching Distance

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The famous Consulting Detective and his blogger.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello friends. Life has been really crazy for me. I am starting a new job and jumping through all these hoops just to get said job has eaten most of my time. That, and the fact I was abroad for most of August, well...yes. So here is chapter three. Two chapter coming up for 'Afters' for this one, and I will try to get them out in a more timely matter, as well as some of the requests I have in my queue. Thank you all for being lovely, and patient, and wonderful. 
> 
> xxHoney

* * *

“Fantastic!” Sherlock exclaims.

 _“No,”_ Jane moans.

“Truly, one of your better ideas, Jane.” He pushes through the gaggle of police officers sectioning off a portion of the stage where they were just finishing clearing the scene.

“Please, stop talking,” she says, pressing her fingers into her brow to ward off a tension headache. _One quiet night out. Was that really too much to ask?_

“To think what we almost _missed!”_ he says, gesturing to the high vaulted ceilings of the theatre. Jane groans again, pinching the bridge of her nose. “Brilliant!”

“Sherlock. Timing,” Jane murmurs as they pass a series of ashen faced witnesses.

“LIVE MURDER!” he booms. One of the witnesses gasps, and covers her mouth.

“I’m never taking you anywhere. Ever. Again.”

 _“See?_ It is entirely possible for the victim to have inadvertently murdered himself, Jane. I suggest you remember this the next time we play [Cluedo.”](http://archiveofourown.org/works/914021/chapters/5158856)

“We aren’t playing Cluedo ever again, thank you very much. In fact, remind me to crucify it to the bloody wall when we get home, won’t you?” Jane says gritting her teeth.

“Hm. That’s a bit violent, Jane,” Sherlock remarks, continuing to make a beeline for the exit.

“It passes the time,” Jane mutters darkly. Sherlock looks at her askance, and wisely doesn’t comment.

“Oh no you don’t,” Lestrade says just before Sherlock reaches the lobby doors. “There is a lot of press outside, and the last thing I need is a PR problem.”

“They won’t be interested in us,” Sherlock dismisses, and tries to go around the harried Detective Inspector.

“Yeah, that was before you were an internet phenomenon,” Lestrade remarks, and steps in front of Sherlock, brows furrowed in disgruntlement. “A couple of them want photos of you two. Specifically.” Jane brightens at this. Even though she thought the sudden publicity was odd, it proved that her blog really was something.

“Oh for god’s sake,” Sherlock says, whipping around on his heel. “We’ll just take the back, then.”

“No good,” Lestrade says, hurrying to keep pace. “They’re at the stage door also.” Sherlock lets out a frustrated groan/whine thing that reminds Jane of a cranky five-year-old.

“Aw, come on, Sherlock,” she says, ribbing him a little. She follows him into one of the dressing rooms where he immediately begins to tear various articles of clothing off of the nearest rack. “This could be good for your public image.”

“I’m a private detective; the last thing I need is a ‘public image.’” He mashes some sort of hat — a deer stalker — onto his head, and Jane can’t help but snort her amusement. His rebellious curls don’t take kindly to their new bonnet, and they stick out wildly from the sides. And with the earflaps tied up, his hair looks positively manic where it’s trying to escape. “What?”

“That, erm,” Jane clears her throat, trying to stifle her grin, “is very fetching on you.”

Sherlock rolls his eyes and tugs off his blue scarf. “Shut up,” he says, and drapes the scarf over her head. He takes the end and tosses it across her face like some jaded Hollywood starlet.

“Hey!”

“Cover up, and walk fast,” he says and turns left down the corridor towards the stage door.

“Sherlock,” Lestrade calls from behind them. “I still need a statement!”

Sherlock doesn’t answer, as is typical.

“Sherlock!”

“I’ll make sure, Greg,” she says, and Sherlock drags her behind him with an impatient growl. He pushes open the door, and Jane hardly has time to catch her breath before everything goes instantly pear-shaped.

It only takes one person yelling, _“Sherlock Holmes!”_ to ignite the hysteria, causing flashbulbs and shouting to all erupt at once. The crowd surges forward, and just like that, Jane’s hand slips out of Sherlock’s.

“Jane!” he shouts, trying to go to her, but the cameras flash in his face, causing him to shrink back and pull up his collar. 

Someone snatches at the scarf on her head, pulling her hair, and Jane just manages to grab it before it falls off.

“Sherlock!” she calls, her voice getting swallowed up by the crowd. 

Someone bodily moves her aside, and she finds herself being jostled by the press, people with camera phones, and general fans of the ruined show looking for something to get back a bit of their spoiled entertainment. Someone’s elbow crashes down on Jane’s collarbone, and in the melee she stumbles and lands hard on the pavement. She curses, and tries to stand back up, but there are people all around, and in their struggle to get closer, they end up pushing her down even more. A foot comes down on her hand, and she cries out as panic starts to creep up her spine. 

She wasn’t being trampled, not yet, but it was a near thing, and the wall of people felt like it was closing in on her on all sides. A gap opens up to her right, and Jane tries to crawl towards it, only to be kicked in the chin a moment later, knocking her silly. Her vision blurs and her hearing tunnels out for a moment, and she isn’t sure but she thinks she can hear Sherlock calling for her again. Before she has a chance to orient herself and respond back, however, she finds herself being pulled up roughly by the waist.

“Get off me!” she snarls, and tries to break out of the iron grip that has her.

“Relax, darling,” a suave and vaguely familiar voice says from behind her.

She turns her head, and still a little bleary says, “Athos?”

“The one and only,” says Mycroft’s PA, and Jane can hear Greg’s booming orders barked out across the crowd as he tries to break up the chaos. Athos steers her directly towards a black town car, but Jane stops and shakes out of his grasp. She cranes her neck and stands on tiptoe to try and get a glimpse of Sherlock.

At last, the crowd parts with Greg leading the way followed by a wild looking Sherlock in his wake. His eyes are busy scanning the crowd, and when he spots Mycroft’s car, he scowls in such annoyance that Jane can’t help but chuckle.

As if sensing her presence, Sherlock’s eyes suddenly snap to hers, startling her with its intensity. The relief that floods his face is magnified tenfold within her, and she feels the tension drain from her own neck and shoulders. There is [a moment](http://archiveofourown.org/works/914021/chapters/5981456) that passes between them — suspended like a lifetime between heartbeats — before Sherlock is suddenly pushing past Lestrade, ignoring the shouts and cameras from the crowd. Jane has to stop herself from rushing back into the hubbub just so she can get to him sooner as her own urgency nearly overtakes her. There was far, far too much distance between them; it simply wouldn't do.

“Are you all right?” he demands when he reaches her, clasping her shoulders and looking earnestly into her face. He _tsks_ and lightly touches the bruise no doubt just beginning to bloom on her jaw.

“I’m fine,” she says, smiling at the absurd hat still perched on his head. He rolls his eyes, and tears off the stupid thing, throwing it into the crowd and scoffing at their sudden rabid enthusiasm.

“Bloody vultures,” he mutters darkly, and follows Jane into the back of the town car. Athos doesn’t follow. Instead, he shuts the door and bangs the roof of the car to signal the driver, thumbs flying over his Blackberry a moment later. Jane doesn’t know why, but she is immensely relieved Mycroft’s PA isn’t joining them. She feels wound tight like a spring, and the clashing dynamics of Sherlock and Athos -- who can’t seem to refrain from making advances on her just to irritate the younger Holmes -- would just be a bit too much at the moment. It is already bad enough that Sherlock is currently fuming at the fact they are in Mycroft’s car in the first place. No need for the little ponce to exacerbate Sherlock’s possessive side.

Sherlock's phone buzzes with an incoming text, and he glares at it with a thunderous expression. Jane just manages to take it from him before he gets the window down so he could chuck it outside.

“Ah, no. This is already your second mobile this month. Let’s try to make it last, hm?” she says and looks down at the text before turning it off.

_Thought London’s newest celebrity could use a lift. Try not to disgrace our family with your new-found fame. M_

She scoffs, slipping it into her jacket pocket. _Holmeses, honestly._

“He’s insufferable,” Sherlock says, crossing his arms in a huff.

“Pot. Kettle,” Jane says, unable to help herself from ribbing him one more time.

“Oh shut up.”

Jane smirks again, but lets him have his sulk, not minding the shared silence between them as she looks out the window.

When they arrive at Baker Street, Sherlock all but flings himself from the car in a fury of black whirling coat and stomps his way into the flat without so much as a by-your-leave. Jane shakes her head in exasperation. He was such a drama queen.

“My goodness,” their landlady says, fluttering nervously in the foyer.

“Sorry about him, Mrs. Hudson,” Jane says, pulling the door shut.

“Ooh he’s in a terrible snit, isn’t he? I only wanted to tell him that his package arrived, and he nearly took my head off.”

“I’ll take it up to him, if you want,” Jane says, sighing.

“Oh you’re a dear. I’ll just go and fetch it, shall I? Come in, Jane, I just put the kettle on.”

Twenty minutes, half a pot of tea, and a side of juicy gossip later, Jane makes her way up to the flat with a jammy dodger between her teeth, and a large cardboard envelope under her arm.

Sherlock, of course, is in front of the window sawing away at his violin so vociferously a few white bow hairs have come loose and are being lashed about at the tip. She sighs yet again. She only just managed to get him to stop torturing the damn thing.

“Sherlock,” Jane says, looking at the front of the envelope. He ignores her, the violin giving a gruesome wail. Jane frowns, noticing the return address is posted as New Scotland Yard. “Sherlock. I think you got something from Lestrade.”

Sherlock ceases playing, the note cutting off abruptly when he finally turns around. He takes one look at the parcel in Jane’s hands, and his face instantly snaps into a delighted, almost feral-like expression. He sets the instrument down haphazardly on his leather armchair, and bounds across the room. To be honest, it’s quite frightening, especially when he insists on prowling like a bloody jaguar.

 _“Finally!”_ Sherlock says, snatching it from Jane.

“What is it?” Jane asks. Sherlock rips the seal with a flourish of his long fingers.

“It’s something I’ve been expecting for quite some time now.” He pulls a sheaf of papers out with no heed of the envelope, and rifles through them. Jane waits, shifting impatiently.

“Well? What’s got you all bright-eyed?” Jane says.

Sherlock takes a breath, surely about to launch into what ever it was had him so eager, but at the last moment it gets stuck in his throat.

“It’s…er, well. It’s — I — erm…”

Jane’s eyebrows rise in amusement as she watches him fumble. She can’t recall seeing Sherlock so inarticulate before.

“Yes?”

Sherlock looks at a spot over her shoulder, visibly struggling with a sudden onset of indecision. He looks like a kid who’s simply bursting to divulge a great and terrible secret, and yet wants to keep it all to himself. Eventually the former wins out, and his mercurial gaze lights upon her once more.

“It’s for…you, actually,” Sherlock says, haltingly.

And what ever Jane thought the big mystery was, this clearly wasn’t what she had expected. She blinks.

“For me? Like a present?”

“Ye — what? No, don’t be ridiculous.”

Jane grins only wider as she notes the blush creeping up Sherlock’s neck. “A _Christmas_ present?”

“Don’t be preposterous.”

“You’re repeating yourself.”

“No, last time I said ‘ridiculous’,” Sherlock argues.

“Same thing,” she shrugs, not rising to the bait of his usually infuriating pedantry. “Christmas present,” she states.

He flusters. “The arrival of this parcel is purely coincidental to that of goings-on of the holiday season. It’s not a _Christmas Present_.” The disdain with which he says this is palpable.

“Right,” Jane says, wholly unconvinced. “Because you don’t do things like this.”

“Precisely.”

“Then you wouldn’t mind if I have it now.”

Sherlock narrows his eyes, but doesn’t concede to the trap he’s fallen into. “Of course,” he says handing the stack imperiously over to her. She takes it with an air of triumph to which Sherlock tries his hardest to look supremely disinterested by. But she knows better, and she can’t help flaunting it a little. She takes off the clip binding the papers together with a little flourish, and settles in to read.

At first, Jane doesn’t know exactly what she is looking at. From what she can see, it’s mostly carbon copies of past indictments and suspect processing. In a familiar hand that Jane swiftly recognises as her uncle’s messy scrawl, she reads about various assault charges pressed against—

“Dr. Martin Ella?” Jane says, dumbfounded. She checks the date, and notices the case was opened January 29th, the last day she saw her bloody awful therapist who tried to make a pass at her. She never filed an official inquiry, however, due to the fact that she subsequently…lost her temper. Somehow, she gathered that asking the police to investigate Ella after the minor incident that transpired was perhaps a Bit Not Good. 

So, if she didn’t file this report that led to his accusation, the question is…who did?

She looks up at her detective, a tentative hope blooming in her chest. She sucks in a breath when she sees the confirmation shining back at her in Sherlock’s eyes.

He clears his throat, suddenly bashful. “You’ll be happy to know, ah, Dr. Ella has been stripped of his title and is currently serving time for assault, coercion, and attempted rape.”

“How did you know? I’ve never told anyone,” Jane says, awestruck.

“Please,” he scoffs. It comes out sounding more fond than scornful, however. “It was written all over you the second you walked into the lab that day. Posture rigid, hair in disarray. The acuity of your awareness to others’ proximity. That, and the fact Mycroft is constitutionally incapable of staying out of my affairs. You had him a bit worried, especially given the fact you snapped Ella’s arm as if it were nothing but a tree branch. When he told me Ella was your therapist, I simply put two and two together and called Lestrade.”

“But…you didn’t even _know_ me. Why would you do that?” she asks, her throat going strangely tight.

“I…didn’t really think about it at the time,” Sherlock says, turning away from her. “I just knew that —” He cuts himself off, walking towards the fireplace and placing both hands flat on the mantle.

“What?” she ventures. She takes a few steps towards him.

He shakes his head, chuckling darkly. “I just knew that I _wanted_ you.” He tenses his shoulders as if embarrassed by his foolishness, before meeting her gaze in the mirror. “Strange what motivates us, don’t you think?”

His words are weighted with deeper meaning that isn’t lost on Jane, her own memory harkening back to the day where their lives auspiciously collided. She remembers the curious pull Sherlock had over her, and how she felt like she would do anything for him, acting on the overwhelming impulse of keeping him safe. She looks steadily back at him.

“I would do it all again, you know,” she says.

His pale eyes are searing, and a frisson of dark heat races through her, making her pulse thrum headily in her veins. She bites her lip, and Sherlock’s eyes flick to her mouth, pupils dilating. 

He turns around, his throat working as he swallows, and Jane’s eyes are drawn to the hollow at the base of his neck before traveling back up to his angular face. The dim lighting of the flat only serves to make him look otherworldly. 

“I would, too.” His voice is deep, and he breaches the distance between them inch by inch. He reaches out and tucks a stand of her hair behind her ear, the move curiously chaste even though Jane can read the intensity corded in his body. For a moment she thinks he is going to kiss her, and for the first time in the months she’s been back she welcomes the idea, finally casting off her last lingering inhibitions. Instead, he lightly touches her cheek, smiling almost sadly before he pulls away to maintain a more respectable distance. 

Jane feels shivery and bereft from the loss, and hugs the documents to her chest as she watches him pick up his bow and instrument in order to resume his playing. “Well, thank you, Sherlock. This means more than you know,” she says before he can draw the bow across the strings. He pauses, glancing at her, and nods once.

The notes spill forth in a beautiful melody which accompanies her up the stairs to her room. It makes her feel lighter than she’s felt in a while, and yet inexplicably sad. 

She tries not to think too hard on it, and puts the papers in the shoe box at the bottom of her wardrobe.

She gets ready for bed, braiding her hair in front of her mirror and letting the dulcet strains of Paganini sink into her. The music ebbs at her like the tide, drawing her to her bed where she sinks down into the plush mattress and warm duvet.

The last thought Jane has before the darkness takes her is of Sherlock’s hands burning into her skin, his fingers resting over the spaces between her ribs, and of his eyes piercing into her as they endlessly collide across the expanse of the universe…

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In case you are unaware, this is loosely based on the 'Aluminium Crutch' on the Blog of Dr. John Watson.
> 
> *Links in 'Afters' (finally) updated!


	4. Doppleganger

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sherlock has been appointed by the highest authority.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey friends! I am sorry it's been a while on this story. I've been consumed with my little!Sherlock story, 'Not Leaving' and I got a bit distracted. Trying to balance between writing multiple stories is a bit tricky, so bare with me! You all are fantastic, and I hope you like this chapter. Especially because we have Sherlock parading around in a bed sheet most of the chapter, so.
> 
> ;)  
> xxHoney.

* * *

_Sent — 11:08 AM_  
_what have you done, and why am I in a bloody helicopter?_

is the text Jane sends Sherlock as said helicopter is taking off from the ground where she was just at a crime scene moments before. As if talking to her half-naked flatmate via Skype wasn’t embarrassing enough, getting the call that _this_ was her ride to some undisclosed location is just the cherry on top, really. 

_Sent — 11:20 AM_  
_sherlock. seriously. should I be worried?_

“Ma’am,” the voice of the pilot crackles in her headphones. “Please refrain from using your mobile device while we are airborne.”

“Right, sorry,” Jane says. She sighs through her nose, and tucks her phone into her jeans pocket. “Any chance you can tell me where it is we are going?”

“Didn’t they tell you? Buckingham Palace,” the pilot says, giving her a sceptical look.

“Of course,” Jane says clenching her jaw.

_I just might kill him._

* * *

The large man who rudely shut his laptop in the middle of his investigation, sets a neat stack of Sherlock's clothes down on the desk. (Good thing he already saw all he needed to solve the case, even though he did end up deducing a bit more than he anticipated about his podgy client.)

“Pardon me, heart _what?_ As in heart condition?” comes the dim, and very belated reply. Sherlock nearly forgot about the client in his annoyance, and he cringes inwardly.

“No matter. Rest assured the case has been solved, Henry. Mrs. Hudson will show you out,” he dismisses.

“It’s Phil,” he says weakly, and Mrs. Hudson helps him to his feet with a motherly hand on his elbow.

“There, there, dear. You heard him, all will be well. But I might pop round the doctor for a check-up. Couldn’t hurt,” she says, shooting Sherlock a concerned glance, and shuffling to the door. 

“Please, Mr. Holmes,” the man says gritting his teeth. “Where you are going, you will want to be dressed.”

Sherlock sniffs disdainfully, clutching the sheet wrapped around him closer to himself in petulant defiance. His eyes flash over the man rapid fire. Based on his hair cut, manicure, the matches in his breast pocket, and evidence of two (no _three_ ) dogs — he knew _exactly_ where they were going.

“I’ll go with you,” Sherlock says imperiously as if he actually has a choice in the matter. (He most likely doesn’t.) “But on one condition.”

His eyes flit to the neatly wrapped present sitting next to his chair, a mischievous grin curling the corner of his lips.

***

The theatrics really were dull. Mycroft could be so predictable at times, but Sherlock will admit the fact he is currently sitting in Buckingham Palace is a _little_ intriguing. He must be in need of his help rather direly if he gave ‘Brutus’ the directive to deliver him by whatever means necessary, even letting him walk out of the flat still dressed in the sheet. He smirks to himself, looking at his stack of clothes sitting on the ornately carved mahogany table in front of him. The present Jane got him is sitting just under his shoes. She would have to let him open it now, surely. Once she got here, of course.

As if on cue, Sherlock hears Jane’s sensible shoes tapping cautiously against the marble floors. She’s getting closer, but every so often her steps falter, no doubt ogling the lavish surroundings of the Palace. He feels anticipation warring with annoyance. (Yes, yes, it’s a palace, tapestries and oil paintings and ornate filigree on the ceilings and _come on already, Jane_.) 

Finally, Jane makes it into the antechamber to the room he was in. He looks at her, and has to repress another smirk as she cranes her head back to look at the crystal chandelier sparkling in the natural light pouring in from the floor-to-ceiling windows. She, eventually spots him, however, and her eyebrows lilt in bemusement. She gestures silently, arm sweeping out to encompass the hall, and Sherlock merely shrugs.

She nods, seemingly not wanting to break the silence, (almost unsure if she’s even allowed, probably) and resolutely marches towards him. She narrows her eyes at his state of undress, and spots the clothes sitting on the table. If she’s curious as to what the gift is doing here, she doesn’t make it known, instead sitting stiffly next to him on the Italian leather sofa.

“Are you wearing any pants?” she asks after a beat, staring straight ahead.

“No,” he answers swiftly.

“Okay.”

After another moment of silence, they both turn to look at each other and promptly burst out laughing.

“Oh my god,” Jane says, bracketing her eyes with her forefinger and thumb as her shoulders shake with giggles. “The bloody Palace. Okay, fine. Absolutely fine.”

“Fine?” Sherlock says, laughter still rumbling out of him.

“No. I am _seriously_ trying to rein in the impulse to steal one of those nice crystal ashtrays.”

“You don’t even smoke,” Sherlock chuckles.

“That’s the point,” Jane says, tears of mirth in her eyes. “Seriously, though. What the hell are we doing here?”

“No idea.”

“Here to see the Queen?” Jane asks.

At that exact moment, Mycroft walks in clearing his throat.

“Oh, apparently, yes,” Sherlock snarks, and Jane snorts loudly, a new fit of hysterics bubbling up. Her cheeks turn a lovely pink as she tires desperately to stifle her laughter.

Mycroft bristles. “Could you both act like adults for once in your life?”

Jane levels him a patronising _‘aren’t you cute?’_ sort of look. “Mycroft. Your brother solves crimes, I blog about it on the internet, and he forgets his underwear. What do you think?”

“Indeed,” Mycroft says, heaving a long-suffering sigh. It’s vastly irritating.

“I was on a case, Mycroft,” Sherlock snaps, scowling fiercely. (Arrogant, pompous, infuriating —)

“What, the hiker and the backfiring car? I glanced at the police report. Bit obvious isn’t it?” Mycroft says with an unctuous smirk.

( — _overweight,_ good for nothing, toffee-nosed, arse-faced, _bastard_.)

“Transparent,” is Sherlock bitten-off reply.

“Then it’s settled.”

“What? It’s not transparent to me,” Jane says, startled. They both ignore her.

“Time to move on, then?” Mycroft says, picking up Sherlock’s pile of clothes and holding it out expectantly. When Sherlock refuses to make a move, Mycroft’s composure finally cracks. “We are sitting in the very heart of the British Nation; Sherlock Holmes, _put your clothes on!”_

“Well that’s not up to me, is it?” Sherlock says, shooting a glance at Jane. He was already being gratuitously obstinate, might as well draw it out just a little longer. Jane, at first, frowns in confusion before darting a look at the prim present box in Mycroft’s hands as he continues to hold the clothes out for him. It doesn’t take her long to cotton on, and she glowers at him.

“Oh _honestly,_ Sherlock,” she grumbles, folding her arms across her chest while he gives her a Cheshire grin.

“Sherlock. Trousers. _Now,”_ Mycroft snaps. It’s a sign that his older brother is well and truly irritated when he is reduced to single syllable directives. Sherlock takes it as a victory.

“What for?” he says, arching a bored eyebrow.

“Your client,” Mycroft sneers condescendingly.

A spike of anger lights up Sherlock’s blood, and he rises to his feet, clutching the sheet to him. “And _my client_ is?”

“Illustrious in every sense of the word,” comes a voice through the antechamber. Sherlock turns to see a stately man (the equerry, no doubt) strolling into the room, his hard soles tapping against the floor. “And shall remain, for obvious reasons, entirely anonymous.”

“Harry,” Mycroft says, crossing the room to shake the man’s hand. “I do so apologise for the state of my little brother.”

“Not to worry, Mycroft. I’m sure it’s a full-time occupation, apologising on his behalf,” he says with a cheeky grin, and Sherlock bristles even more. Before he can cut in with a snide remark about the equerry’s no-doubt cheating wife, the man turns towards Jane. “And this must be Dr. Watson, formerly of the Fifth Northumberland Fusiliers.”

“Yes, hello,” Jane says cordially, taking his proffered hand.

“My employer is a tremendous fan of your blog. Particularly the case of ‘The Aluminium Crutch,’” he says.

“I — thank you!” Jane says, a flattered blush staining her cheeks. Sherlock rolls his eyes.

“And Mr. Holmes the younger,” he says offering his hand to which Sherlock ignores. “I will confess, I thought you’d be taller.”

“I take the precaution of a good coat and a short girlfriend,” Sherlock clips. Jane sputters beside him, but he ignores it, stepping up into Mycroft’s space. “I don’t _do_ anonymous clients, Mycroft. I’m used to mystery at one end of my cases. Both ends is simply too much work. Good day. Jane?”

He marches past, expecting Jane to follow, his sheet brushing along the floor like the train to a gown.

Suddenly, the sheet jerks and pulls taut, slipping from his naked body. He just manages to grab the end and clutch it around his waist before he _actually_ embarrasses himself.

“Grow up,” Mycroft says, his big, fat foot the culprit. (It’s like they are children again, and Sherlock reflects how ironic that statement really is.)

“Get off my _sheet!”_ he snarls.

“Or what?” he challenges in that familiar way of his. ( _I dare you, Sherlock. Don’t be a big baby. You’re stupid; I’m telling Mummy_.)

“Or I’ll just walk away,” Sherlock sniffs, as if walking around Buckingham Palace completely starkers is no big hardship.

“Boys,” Jane says, intervening. “Not here.”

“Who. Is. My. CLIENT?” Sherlock growls.

“Take a look at where you are standing and _make a deduction._ You have been summoned by the highest in the land, now for god’s sake,” he takes a breath to rein himself in. “Put your clothes on!”

Sherlock snaps the sheet out from under Mycroft’s foot so he can wrap it around himself like a toga. He turns around and glares at his brother before looking pointedly at Jane. She gathers the pile of clothes, leaving the present on the table, and walks over, holding it out to him.

“Jane,” he says.

“What?”

“I’ll be needing a _shirt.”_

“You have one right —” she starts before she catches on to what Sherlock is implying. “Oh for the love of…” she mutters, and stomps back over to the table to snatch up the present. She shoves it into Sherlock’s chest, almost causing him to drop his clothes and his sheet. He can’t help but smirk, however, as she storms away, back to the sofa.

“Thank you, Jane,” he says just to be irritating. She flops down, aggravated.

“Piss off.” 

***

Finally dressed, Sherlock saunters back into the room with a pleased grin on his face, doing up the second to last button on the shirt Jane got him. It’s sinfully soft against his skin, and it’s just the thing he would have picked for himself, if not for the colour. It’s quite bold even for his tastes, and it’s not something he would have thought he could pull off given his fair complexion and preference of a more monochromatic colour pallet. But when he inspected himself in the gilded mirror in the powder room, he could admit that he actually looks quite dashing in aubergine.

(And if the faint blush on Jane’s cheeks is any indication, it appears she agrees.)

He smirks at her, and she rolls her eyes as he sits down, unbuttoning his suit jacket to maintain the crisp lines.

“Why Jane, I didn’t know you had such extravagant tastes,” he says.

“Shut up, you great menace,” she says elbowing him. He elbows her back.

“Children, please,” Mycroft chides as brings the tea service over to the small table, and sits across from them next to the equerry. Both Jane and Sherlock suppress a grin. Mycroft darts them one last stern glare before he picks up the tea pot. “I’ll be mother,” he jokes.

“There's a whole childhood in a nutshell,” Sherlock can’t resist but jab. Mycroft glowers at him.

“My employer has a problem,” the equerry says to Sherlock.

“A matter of extreme delicacy and potentially criminal in nature has come to light, and in this hour of dark need, dear brother, your name has arisen.”

“Why me? You have a police force, of sorts, and a marginally reputable Secret Service.”

“Is it not safe to assume people come to you for help, Mr. Holmes,” the equerry says.

“Not anyone with the Royal Navy, that I know,” Sherlock says.

“This is a matter of highest security, and therefore of trust,” Mycroft states.

“Ironic, then, you should come to me, Mycroft. What, you don’t trust your own Secret Service?”

“Naturally not. They all spy on people for money.”

Jane huffs a laugh, and the equerry shifts impatiently in his seat.

“I believe we have a timetable.”

“Of course,” Mycroft says amenably, and takes out a silver briefcase, flicking open the latches. He pulls out a glossy 8x10 surveillance photo, and hands it to Sherlock. His eyes track over the candid shot of a woman with a delicate shoulders, (posture erect despite her stature, confident, used to getting what she wants) flawless makeup, (uses her appearance to manipulate), and fiery red hair. “What do you know about this woman?”

“Nothing whatsoever,” Sherlock says taking the rest of the photos from Mycroft. They are screenshots of a website with a gothic design, red and black lace, and a shot of a woman from the back of the shoulders down in a tightly laced corset and scandalous knickers. The title of the page is _The Whip Hand,_ and the marquee states: _‘Know when you are beaten.’_

“Then you haven’t been paying attention. She’s been in the centre of two political scandals this year alone, and just recently ended the marriage of a prominent novelist by having an affair with both participants separately,” Mycroft says, and something about that catches Sherlock’s attention. He looks back at the photo of the woman with hair that matches her lipstick.

“You know I don’t concern myself with trivia. Who is she?”

“Irene Adler,” Mycroft provides. Sherlock doesn’t miss the scrutinising look leveled at him, and his suspicions are even more heightened. “Professionally known as The Woman.”

“Professionally?” Jane asks, leaning over to look at the photos in Sherlock’s hands.

“I believe she prefers the term, ‘Dominatrix,’” Mycroft says.

“Dominatrix,” Sherlock repeats, bemused.

“Don’t be alarmed,” Mycroft says, upper lip curling into a cruel jeer. “It’s to do with sex.”

“Sex doesn’t alarm me,” Sherlock snaps.

“How would _you_ know?” Mycroft says, and Sherlock blanches, reeling back a little. Without consciously meaning to, he concedes this [battle of wit and will](http://archiveofourown.org/works/914021/chapters/14861404) to his elder brother once again, and averts his eyes. Jane tenses next to him, and he tries his best to ignore it. “She provides what you would call — _recreational scolding_ — for those who enjoy that sort of entertainment, and are willing to pay for it.”

“Let me guess. This Adler woman has some photos in her possession that feature someone of significance to your employer in some rather _compromising_ scenarios?” Sherlock asks the equerry.

“You are very quick, Mr. Holmes,” the equerry says.

“Hardly a difficult deduction. Who is it then?” Sherlock asks, not really needing a confirmation. (He had a pretty good idea who it was. If this mysterious Woman was out for blood, she would strike where the iron was most hot.)

The equerry balks for a moment. “Like you said…someone of significance to my employer. We prefer not to say anything else at this time.”

“You can’t tell me anything?” Sherlock implores, just to see the man squirm.

“We can tell you it’s a young person,” Mycroft intercedes. Sherlock refuses to look at him. “A young _female_ person.” (Just as he thought.)

“Ah,” Sherlock remarks just as Jane chokes on her tea. “How many photographs?”

“A considerable number,” Mycroft says, his voice strained. Sherlock darts a glance in his direction, but it isn’t long enough to deduce anything.

“Will you take the case, Mr. Holmes?” the equerry asks hopefully.

“Mm, no. Jane, you might want to put that cup back in its saucer, we’re leaving,” he says and gets to his feet in one fluid motion. The equerry jumps to his feet as well, and so does Mycroft except with more grace and pompousness. (Arrogant bastard.) “You’ve got nothing; she’s beaten you, innuendo very much implied. Pay her in full, and immediately. Given her masthead, it’s time you got with the programme.” Sherlock buttons his suit jacket, and starts to usher Jane towards the exit.

The equerry begins to sputter his protests, but before he can give himself a coronary, Mycroft speaks up.

“She doesn’t want anything.”

Finally, Sherlock does look at his brother, unable to hide the delighted shock that is surely on his face. “What did you say?”

“She got in touch, informed us that the photographs existed but that she would not attempt to use them to extort either money or favour.”

“Oh a power play. That is interesting,” Sherlock breathes, his mind ticking back to a thought he had dismissed earlier. (Could it be —? Oh yes, very clever.) “A power play with the most powerful family in Britain. Now _that’s_ what you call a dominatrix. This is getting rather fun, now, isn’t it?”

“Sherlock,” Jane warns.

“I can tell you one thing I am almost certain of,” Sherlock says, addressing the equerry, but observing Jane from his peripheral, “This Ms. Adler, is more than meets the eye. Oh yes, being in two places simultaneously, participating in a lascivious affair with both parties for so long isn’t easy. And then there’s the fact she was successfully at the heart of numerous political scandals without being defamed herself — I mean, the press should be drooling all over her. I know I don’t concern myself with society’s gossip, but even I’m not that oblivious.”

“What are you talking about?” Jane asks.

“It’s obvious isn’t it? Especially now with this bloody fantastic ace up her sleeve.” He waits to see if anyone (other than Mycroft who is looking particularly smug at the moment) will catch on. They don’t of course. “Ms. Adler is in fact, two separate people. I would bet money on _that_ ,” he tosses his head in the direction of the photos spread out on the table, “being the doppelganger.”

“There are _two_ Irene Adlers?” the equerry exclaims, flushing an unattractive shade of beetroot.

“Don’t be an idiot,” Sherlock disdains. “There’s only one Irene Adler. But a woman who makes a move as grand scale as this obviously has a lot to lose. She wouldn’t dare put her own face out there.”

“Brilliant,” Jane says, into the stunned silence while the equerry gapes like a dying fish.

“Text me her location; I will be in touch by the end of the day,” Sherlock says, swinging on his coat like a matador.

The equerry recovers slightly. “Do you really think you’ll have information by then?”

“No. I think I’ll have the photographs,” he says with a feral grin. 

“One can only hope you are a good as you claim, Mr. Holmes.”

Sherlock scrutinises him, taking up the challenge. Deductions fly at him as if superimposed in the air, (dog lover; public school; horse rider; early riser; left side of bed; keen reader, tea drinker, father – half welsh; _non smoker,_ oh interesting…) and he smirks, already formulating a plan in his head in dealing with the likes of Ms. Adler.

“I need some equipment, of course,” Sherlock says.

“Anything you need will be afforded to you. I’ll have it sent to —”

“I’ll be needing a box of matches,” Sherlock says to the equerry, speaking over Mycroft.

“I’m sorry?”

“Or your cigarette lighter. Either one will do.”

“I don’t smoke,” the equerry says.

“I know _you_ don’t. But your employer does,” Sherlock says, baring his teeth slightly. 

The equerry starts, lips pursing together, before reaching into his breast pocket to retrieve a silver lighter. “We have kept a lot of people successfully in the dark about this little fact, Mr. Holmes,” he says with a bit of warning colouring his tone.

Sherlock winks. “I’m not the Commonwealth.”

“And that’s about as modest as he gets,” Jane says. 

Sherlock turns on his heel, confident that she is right behind him. He throws a negligent hand in the air with his usual panache. “Lat’ers!”

“Honestly,” Jane exasperates.

***

In the taxi on the way back to Baker Street, Jane sits stiffly next to him, the tension rolling off her in waves. Sherlock fidgets next to her, trying not to let his nervousness show. He knows what she’s thinking, of course he does. Mycroft and his big mouth, and his ridiculous insinuations. The question is there, hovering in the corners of her mouth, the tightness in her shoulders. She should just ask already and get it over with. Sherlock’s mouth twists in a bitter grimace, and his stomach feels slick with unease in anticipation of the inevitable conversation. 

In his line of work, it was his job to know what motivated people, and the carnal desires of the flesh were simply another form of _modus operandi_ as far as he was concerned. 

Sex; the release of endorphins and oxytocin stimulating a chemical high that consumed people’s thoughts, and under the right set of grizzly circumstances, drove them to commit unspeakable acts. Of course he was familiar with this process, despite what Mycroft implied. He needed to be in order to understand what made people do what they did. He wouldn’t be able to call himself a decent scientist, otherwise. However, what forays he did have in his youth were hazy, fumbled affairs at best. It was easy to come to the conclusion that he could do without the whole ordeal, and label himself as being above such pedestrian urges deeming that sex was not worth the short-lived euphoria those chemicals provided. Besides, if he ever did desire that particular gratification, there was always cocaine that garnered similar results that were just as effective.

At least, that was what he told himself.

If Sherlock Holmes was ever a man who was honest with himself, he would admit that the real reason he abstained was due to the fact it was absolutely terrifying. The sheer vulnerability that came with physical intimacy was unsettling in the most extreme simply because he was in his absolute basest form; no more intelligent than a wild animal, subsumed by the demands of his transport. It also became nigh impossible to hide behind any façade he may have made for himself, the intensity all encompassing until it shattered his carefully constructed walls. Because in the throes of something that frenzied, that consuming, his partners always saw him for what he really was; a sociopath. _A Freak._ And in the end, it was this that he feared; the look in their eyes that he saw so frequently staring back at him from mirrors and panes of glass. A confirmation born of hatred and disgust.

But Sherlock Holmes is rarely honest with himself.

“So…” Jane starts, and Sherlock closes his eyes. (Here it was then.) “About all that in there,” she says gesturing vaguely behind her as if the Palace was still retreating in the distance.

“Yes?” Sherlock says tersely. He’s suddenly livid with her. This was _Jane._ She was supposed to be the exception to the rule of all things dull and ordinary. Why, _why_ did she insist on debasing herself as a common gossip? Was it really that important?

“Girlfriend, huh?” she says.

Sherlock’s anger derails so suddenly, it leaves him blinking against the vacuum of vitriolic words he had waiting at the ready. He has to scramble, rewinding the reel in his mind to figure out what she’s talking about.

_‘And Mr. Holmes the younger. I will confess, I thought you’d be taller.’_

_‘I take the precaution of a good coat and a short girlfriend.’_

Of course — _of course_ — this is the salient detail she chooses to focus on. Oh, Jane. Oh, simple, wonderful Jane. He chuckles to himself, and the chuckles turn into a true, full-bodied laugh born out of sheer relief more than anything.

“Is that really so ridiculous?” Jane says mock-offended, a hand over her heart. She giggles alongside him, until they are both breathless and leaning into each other for support.

“No. It’s not,” Sherlock says a moment later, quieting a little as he properly thinks over the turn of events.

“Hm,” Jane says, a smile still on her lips as she turns to look out the window. She doesn’t say anything more, however, and for this he is grateful.

Instead, she takes his hand in hers, the action alone speaking louder than words ever could, and he squeezes her fingers back so strongly it must be uncomfortable for her, although she doesn’t make a move to pull away. 

After a moment, she suddenly turns to him, realisation sparking in her tone. “Hey. How did you know about the smoking?”

“The evidence was right under your nose, Jane. As ever, you see but do not observe.”

“Observe what?” she says. 

Sherlock merely laughs his dark laugh, the weight of the crystal ashtray securely hidden against his breast. 

“Observe _what?”_ she repeats, tugging his hand. 

He smirks, refusing to say anything much to her annoyance. She would simply have to wait for Christmas for her illicit Palace souvenir. Afterall, two could play at that game.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> * Link in Afters updated....FINALLY!


	5. Recognition

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A nun, a vicar, and a prostitute all walk into a bar...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, so if some of you are wondering where I've been, I just have to come clean and say I am cheating on this story with another story of mine called 'Not Leaving.' It...is eating my brain, and I have to apologise to you readers for taking my sweet time with this installment. The cool thing is, I did try to coordinate this particular story with Christmas, so it's extra festive, and I will be working on nothing but this for the rest of the month. Hooray! Anyways. I love you all, and hopefully another chapter will be up sooner rather than later.
> 
> Thank you all for your amazing patience and loyalty.
> 
> xxHoney.

* * *

Jane sets about making tea, trying to ignore the feeling creeping up her spine that settled in ever since they left Buckingham Palace. There was something that just didn’t sit right with her, and it started ever since she caught the flash in Mycroft’s eye when he was describing Irene Adler. If he felt any remorse at having jabbed at his brother that far below the belt, it was overshadowed by something Jane has become good at recognising from the elder Holmes: an _ulterior motive._

There was a reason Mycroft wanted Sherlock to take this case especially, and the way he tore into Sherlock regarding the…nature of the subject matter, was a bright red flag to her. Yes, the brothers regularly sniped at each other, but she had never witnessed such blatant cruelty for cruelty’s sake on either of their behalves. She caught the look telegraphed across Mycroft’s face that was born of equal parts reluctant triumph, and resentment. The latter was particularly aimed in her direction whenever Sherlock wasn’t looking.

The kettle clicks, and Jane pours two mugs of water, plopping two tea bags in to let steep while she lets herself think for a minute. Idly, she dips her pinkie into the pot of sugar and licks it off before she prepares Sherlock’s cup the way she knows he likes.

To her, it all seems like a simple case of blackmail. Granted, blackmail against the Royal Family was nothing to sniff at, but with all of Mycroft’s power and resources, surely to deem him of all people incapable of handling something so… _common_ isn't so far out of his realm that he needs Sherlock’s help. 

No, for some reason Jane can't help but feel like Mycroft is purposefully driving Sherlock into a direct line of fire. The agenda behind this, however, isn’t exactly clear. After the impromptu 'visit' he graced her with the other day, Jane is more convinced than ever that Mycroft is pulling just a bit too hard on everybody’s strings. Sherlock’s in particular. It causes her protective instincts to rear up at the thought.

She feels like she should say something; feels like they really shouldn’t be having anything to do with this Adler woman.

But good luck with trying to talk Sherlock Holmes out of anything, much less a fascinating case.

Needs must, however, so she rallies herself and approaches Sherlock’s bedroom, armed with two cups of tea.

The madman in question is standing in front of his wardrobe looking at himself in the full length mirror on the back of the door. He's presumably admiring himself in a shapeless high vis jacket. 

“What are you doing?”

“Going into battle, Jane. I need the right armour,” Sherlock says. He scowls, and strips off the yellow atrocity. “No.” He attacks his wardrobe once again.

Jane clears her throat setting the two cups of tea on the bedside table. “Are you sure about this? I mean, this case seems sort of…”

“What, Jane?” Sherlock says impatiently. He selects an expensive-looking black oxford, and strips off the purple one she bought him, tossing it on his bed where it falls unceremoniously to the floor. Jane tries not to be miffed at this.

Sherlock huffs impatiently, and Jane looks up from scowling at the discarded garment, watching as he tries to unbutton the cuffs without success. It’s a shirt with smaller mother-of-pearl buttons that he’s having a hard time getting a grip of with his large hands. She rolls her eyes, and takes it from him.

“All I mean is that I didn’t think this would be something up your alley,” Jane tries to say as casually as she can. She’s glad she has something to occupy her hands at that moment. “Fraud, and blackmail don’t really seem that thrilling, to be honest.”

“It’s blackmail against the most powerful family in all of London, Jane,” he insists.

“You’ve said.”

“I thought you’d be happy. We haven’t had a case in ages!”

“We had a case only a few days ago!”

“Jane,” he says. Jane fights with the other cuff. The button holes really were sewn too small. He cups her elbows, stilling her hands. “Look at me.”

She does, and it’s instantly a mistake because she’s essentially in the arms of a half-naked Sherlock Holmes. Like a bloody Mills & Boon cover, and if that's not bad enough, she can feel her heart rate increasing.

She blanches internally at his overwhelming proximity, struggling to maintain her soldierly composure. Honestly, what is wrong with her? She’s seen him shirtless dozens of times, why is this any different? Of course, the times when he’s had to forgo clothes in her presence (royal palaces not included) are usually times when he needs stitching up various places, and then it is strictly clinical. But this is by far more intimate than a flesh wound, and his oxidised copper irises are full of that excitement that lights him up from the inside, and this close she can smell the combination of his dark umber cologne and the citrus aftershave he uses. All of these elements together have the potential to be quite deadly to her rationale, she has come to realise.

He narrows his eyes, scrutinising her to the quick. “Why don’t you want to go on this case?”

“I do,” she says unconvincingly. “Just making sure.” She hands the shirt to him, her arguments dying in her throat. What was she supposed to tell him, anyway? She doesn’t want him to take the case because Mycroft is an arse? That’s all she has to go on, really, and if anything, it would probably urge him to take the case all the more, just so he could prove himself.

Sherlock regards her suspiciously as he does up the buttons, but he drops the matter. He thrusts an arm towards her, and she takes the hint, doing up the unruly cuff.

“So what’s the plan?” Jane asks, setting to work on Sherlock’s other cuff.

“A vicar, a nun, and a prostitute all walk into a bar,” Sherlock says with a manic grin, tucking in his shirttails.

“Yes?” says Jane, waiting for the inevitable punch line. 

“I don’t know; I deleted the rest of the joke,” Sherlock says and rummages in the bottom most drawer of his dressing table. He evidently finds what he is looking for, and turns his back on Jane. After a triumphant, _‘ha!’_ he spins around, sporting an iconic clergyman's dog collar.

“You are insane,” Jane says, shaking her head.

“Come on, Jane!” Sherlock says, swinging on his suit jacket and shoving past her. “The Game is on!”

***

“Do you remember the plan?” Sherlock asks for the fortieth time.

 _“Yes,”_ Jane grits out. She yanks the lighter Sherlock took from the equerry out of her jeans pocket to iterate her point. He only made her recite it back to him verbatim, along with all three contingency plans just to be sure.

“Remember, you have to make an excuse to occupy the imposter Ms. Adler. Knock her out if you have to so you can trip the fire alarm.”

“Sherlock. I’m not about to render someone unconscious if I don’t have to.”

“Yes, but if she’s armed —”

“Wait, is that a possibility?” Jane says, eye flying open wide. Of course he would utterly fail to mention this little detail.

“It could be.”

“Why didn’t you tell me this?! What the hell am I supposed to do without a gun? You do remember mine was lost that night at the pool, don’t you?”

“Ah…” Sherlock says, brow furrowing a little. “I’m sure it won’t come to that,” he dismisses, momentary concern forgotten. She’s about to lay into him again, but the taxi rolls to a stop and Sherlock leaps out, leaving her to deal with the fare. Her irritation grows.

“Sherlock!” she calls, jogging to catch up. She looks up at the high-end condos in central Belgravia, nearly straining her neck in the process. _Why is everything so white?_ she wonders, not for the first time since this little field trip started. “Where are we going?”

“We know her address,” he calls over his shoulder, ducking into an alley. Confused, Jane follows him.

“And for some reason she lives behind a skip, then?” she says wryly. She wouldn’t be surprised, though. Even the allies in Belgravia are posh and somehow cleaner than the description of any alley Jane has come to know.

“No. Two streets away, but this will do,” Sherlock says shortly, ripping the blue scarf away from his neck. “Just need to make the finishing touches to my disguise.”

“Really? You’ve barely even changed your clothes.”

“Then it’s time to add a splash of colour,” he smirks, chucking the scarf at her. She catches it, and starts to fold it into a neat square. “Punch me in the face.”

Jane snorts, but when she looks up she sees that Sherlock isn’t kidding. “Seriously?”

“Yes, didn’t you hear me?” he says, losing patience.

“I always hear ‘punch me in the face’ when you’re talking, but it’s usually subtext,” she replies.

Sherlock groans in frustration. “Jane, we don’t have time for this. Punch me!” He offers his cheek, and she finally gets that he isn’t joking.

“No. Absolutely not,” she says taking a step back.

“Jane —”

_“No.”_

He grabs her arm keeping her from walking out of the alley. “We’re wasting time! Don’t be an idiot.”

The insult is a common one — one that Jane suffers through with a mere roll of her eyes most days. Today however, she is quite irritated, has been in the wake of Mycroft’s off-putting presence, and her flatmate was being extra aggravating. So when he shoves her simply to antagonise her, she shoves back, hard, causing him to stumble a bit.

“Leave off, Sherlock!” she snarls. Instead of taking the hint, he only grins.

 _“Yes._ Anger! Rage! Hit me!” He shoves her again. She tries to skirt around him, but he blocks her, pushing her back by her shoulders. An uncomfortably tight twinge races through her bad shoulder which only pisses her off even more.

“Sherlock! Goddammit!” She swats him with the flat of her hand, causing them both to devolve into a scuffle like children. “Cut it out!”

“Come on, Jane! _Hit me,”_ he says, blocking her ineffectual slaps. He’s genuinely getting frustrated now, his nostrils flaring, his face flushing. She throws off his arms, pushing at him in his chest. They continue to squabble, until one of them finally snaps, the smack of a palm connecting soundly with a cheek. And it isn’t Jane’s.

They both freeze, Jane with a hand up to her face in startled outrage, and Sherlock, eyes wide as if he can’t believe what he had actually done. His expression of shock would have made Jane laugh at any other time, but not now. She can see him visibly try to backpedal, but it’s too late.

“Jane. I — I didn’t —”

She doesn’t even realise she’s hit him until he’s flat on his back on the ground.

 _“OW!”_ she shouts, shaking out her hand.

Sherlock groans, hauling himself up. “Good…shot, Jane. Christ!”

Beyond angry, Jane steps over him, and marches towards the mouth of the alley. He can bloody well do this on his own for all she cares.

“Jane? You can’t leave!” Sherlock says, scrambling to his feet.

 _“Watch_ me,” she bites.

Suddenly, she is being whirled around, her back pressed to a brick wall, long fingers clamped around her wrist. Before she has a chance to lash out again on instinct, her other arm is being manacled in a similar fashion, and in a blink, Sherlock has them pinned above her head, effectively trapping her. Their faces are close, and they are breathing hard, and it would be so easy for Jane to knock him out with a solid ram of her head. But at this distance, she can clearly see where she hit him, a bruise already darkening around the broken skin just on the crest of his cheekbone. Something akin to guilt and a little bit of revulsion coils in her gut, causing her to close her eyes.

“Jane,” Sherlock says, his breath ghosting over her lips. She doesn’t have to see him to picture the look of confusion that is no doubt etched into his face. The tension spills out of her, and she sags against him in defeat.

“You have to remember; I was a soldier, Sherlock,” she says, voice barely above a whisper. She keeps her eyes tightly shut, willing the learned brutality thrumming under her skin into submission

“You were a doctor,” he says, still not understanding.

“I had bad days!” she snaps, finally fixing him with a livid glare. He starts, head jerking back a little, but his hold remains tight. After a few moments of staring at each other, she concedes, and lets a long stream of air out through her nose. “You learn a lot of things during war, Sherlock. Things they can't ever teach you until you’re out there by yourself amongst the terror and the bloodshed. Survival instincts are hard to suppress, and often times their reaction to violence is only more violence. It's conditioning in its simplest form.”

He stares back at her, sea-green eyes tracking over her face, deducing until the realisation slowly dawns in his expression. The pressure against her wrists fades, and he brings her hands down by her sides, settling his own on her waist.

“You fear it. This side of yourself; the loss of control,” he says reading her face as well as her words.

“Look at what I did to you,” she says in answer, voice full of self-recrimination.

“I wanted you to,” Sherlock protests.

“Not the point,” Jane says, trying to move out from the cage of his body. He stalls her again, gently this time, hands coming up to press into the wall on either side of her. 

“I’m sorry,” he intones, his face earnest.

Apologies from the likes of Sherlock Holmes are rare, and in light of this, Jane’s eyes widen and she stops trying to move away from him.

“You are?” she blurts.

“Of course. Despite what you may think, it is never my intention to cause you more distress than is necessary.”

“Tell me that next time I run across kneecaps in the crisper,” she says giving him a hesitant smile. He smiles back, one of his lopsided genuine smiles that is tragically cut short by a wince as he aggravates the bruise on his cheek. Jane clicks her teeth, and gently caresses it with her fingertips. “This needs to be iced.”

“Ooh, is it all puffy and awful?” Sherlock asks with far too much excitement for someone who has recently received a right hook to the face.

“A bit, yeah.”

“Excellent!” he says, dropping an absent kiss on her forehead before spinning away from her. “Nothing is more pathetic than a maimed Vicar. Come on, Jane!”

Jane can’t help but smile a little, and as usual, she has no choice but to follow the mad bastard.

***

It’s all Jane can do in her power to not crack up laughing at Sherlock’s Academy-worthy performance.

God, he is such a cad, even going so far as to summon those infamous crocodile tears simply for the benefit of the small security camera mounted outside the impressive town house.

“Oh, _thank you,”_ he gushes, removing the scarf at just the right time, the clerical collar clearly visible. It only takes another moment before the voice on the other end of the intercom sighs, and unlocks the door. Jane moves.

“I saw the whole thing; I’m a doctor,” she says, following the script and helping usher Sherlock into the foyer. The woman with bright red hair -- Adler No. One -- quirks an amused eyebrow. “Do you have a first aid kit?” Jane asks, hoping to get her alone so Sherlock can find the real Ms. Adler. Hopefully, if all goes to plan, the element of surprise will work in their favour.

The imposter nods her head. “In the kitchen.” Then to Sherlock, “Please,” indicating for him to make himself comfortable in the sitting room.

“Thank you, again. Thank you so much,” he says, voice quavering with the trauma of his ‘mugging.’ Jane is glad the woman’s back is to her because she can’t quite suppress the smirk tugging at her mouth. She’s composed when the woman turns back to her and leads her to the large, state-of-the-art kitchen.

“I’m not sure I caught your name,” Jane says.

“I didn’t give it.”

Well. That was fair enough, she supposes. But, hey, no one could really blame her for trying the direct approach.

The woman goes over to the stainless-steel sink and drops into an elegant crouch, rummaging in the cabinets for something. Jane tenses, ready for any potential threat, but it’s only a plastic case with a red cross on the front.

She unfolds from her crouch, straightening her impeccable pencil skirt, and drops the first aid kit on the granite island. She gives Jane another bland look.

“I assume you will find all you need in there, Doctor,” she says in a cool voice, and turns to leave.

It’s too soon, and Jane isn’t sure if Sherlock has managed to do what he needs to do yet. She needs to stall for time.

“This is great,” she blurts. “But do you mind if I were to use a bowl of warm water? Perhaps a clean towel for a compress?”

Annoyed, the woman crosses back across the tile, her high-heeled shoes clicking in derision. She pulls out a white ceramic bowl, and retrieves a towel from a drawer, huffing a contemptuous breath through her upturned nose.

“Will this suffice?” she says, and before Jane has a chance to respond, she is already marching out of the kitchen. It is just going to have to do. Hopefully, she gave Sherlock enough time to suss out the situation. Chances are, the real Ms. Adler isn’t even here, which in that case, they will just play out the little scenario of vicar and good Samaritan until they can come up with another plan. Jane fills the small bowl, and with a rallying breath, makes her way back to the sitting room.

A voice, melodious and sibilant, has Jane slowing her gait, and she freezes just around the corner from the room where she left Sherlock in.

It sounds like the trill of a harp, that voice: “I’m sorry to hear you’ve been hurt. I don’t think Kate got your name…?”

Ah, so apparently the imposter’s name is _Kate,_ then. That must mean the owner of this voice belongs to —

Jane stops dead just inside the door to the sitting room, water splashing up precariously over the brim of the bowl. It drips to the floor, landing on the plush carpet at her feet. She can hardly be arsed to care, however, given the fact that a clearly beautiful, and clearly _naked_ woman is posed in front of Sherlock — and Sherlock, for his part, is staring back at her, not with chagrin or embarrassment, no, but with something akin to _recognition._

His lips part, his eyes are steadfast, and in the deafening silence he breathes an astonished,

_“You.”_


	6. Du Bon Vieux Temps

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Brainy's the new sexy...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Lookit! Another chapter!!! Wooo! Toldja I would be working like mad on this because I love you all. Hopefully I can make it to the Christmas scene before Christmas is actually over, lol. And for the record, I am very behind on responding to comments, but I will get around to it. If you've left one, I love you. And a special thanks to theemmabruckert for helping me title the chapter.
> 
> I hope you all like it. I've been chewing this idea over for quite a while. :)
> 
> Hope your holidays are going well.
> 
> xxHoney

* * *

Rena. 

Rena Trevor. 

Standing, here, naked before him. (Bloody hell.) How was this even possible? After Victor’s funeral, she made it a point to tell him that if he was ever in Berlin to look her up. As far as he knew, he would never see her again, the loss of her twin brother too much for her to stand being in London. Or so he thought.

“You,” he says again, and she slinks closer straddling his knees, her bare navel at the level of his eyes.

_“Me,”_ she purrs, leaning forward and ripping away the flimsy clerical collar. “Isn’t it tough to remember an alias when you’ve had a bit of a shock? I figured I would level the playing field. See? Now we are both defrocked,” she says, slipping the stark white collar between her blood-red lips, teeth depressing the plastic. She takes it away a moment later, running it softly over her throat, and down in between her breasts. His eyes remain fixed on hers, the same peculiar violet that he remembers. “How have you been, Sherlock?”

“Rena,” he says coolly.

“All grown up. I go by Irene, now. Irene Adler.”

“Of course.” (Mother’s maiden name, not well known, and not closely affiliated with the Trevor estate. A good alias, however, one that still gives her access to funds, no doubt.)

Someone clears their throat from the doorway, and both Sherlock and Irene swivel their heads around at the sound. 

Jane. He almost forgot.

“I’ve missed something, haven’t I?” she says, holding a bowl loosely in her hands. It’s tipping to one side from her neglect, a small dribble of water already darkening the carpet.

“Ooh not at all, _ma chère,”_ Irene coos, walking towards her. “My, my, Sherlock. You’ve lowered your standards, haven’t you?” She caresses Jane’s cheek with the back of her fingers. Jane recoils.

“Would you put something on? Anything,” Jane looks down at the cloth in her hand. “A napkin?”

“Feeling exposed?” she says, arching a thin eyebrow as she continues to circle Jane. “Hm, maybe it’s because she’s not sure where to look? But you do, don’t you Sherlock?” she says fixing him with a pointed stare. “What do you think, dove?” she asks Jane, ignoring her flinch at the pet name. “Wouldn’t you say our Sherlock is just as red-blooded as any?” Jane subtly tries to move away.

“Why couldn’t you have just stayed in Germany, Rena?” Sherlock says standing and pulling off his coat. “You’ve made a mess of things, lately. Things I might not be able to get you out of if you don’t cooperate.” He hands the coat out to her, and with an amused smirk she takes it from him and slides it on.

“Berlin was boring,” she shrugs, hands going up to pin a loose strand of ebony hair piled elegantly on top of her head. “No one to play with. But it looks to me like someone’s been having a go at you, darling. God, those cheekbones are sharper than ever. I could cut my hand slapping that face. Are you sure you won’t give me a try sometime?”

_“Irene.”_

“Someone must love you,” she _tsks._ “If I had to punch that face, I’d avoid your nose and teeth, too.” She darts a look at Jane still stood in the doorway. Jane blushes and shifts her eyes to her feet. “Clever, though, I will give you that. Do you know what the problem is with a disguise, Sherlock? It’s always a self-portrait in the end.”

“You mean to tell me that if you didn’t know any better, you’d think I was a vicar with a bleeding face?” Sherlock says, voice condescending.

“No. But I would conclude you were damaged, delusional, and believe in a higher power — in this case, yourself. And I would be right.” Her eyes glow in that maddeningly ethereal way of hers, and she undoes the top two buttons of his shirt. “Please. Make yourself comfortable,” she says, and sits on the plush divan. “If you’d like some tea, I can call Kate.”

“I had some at the Palace,” Sherlock replies, pacing to the centre of the room. He sees Jane hesitate from the corner of his eye.

“I had some tea, too. In case anyone’s interested,” she grumbles, setting the bowl and cloth on the small glass table before rigidly sitting next to Irene.

“I know you did,” Irene says, her eyes flowing over Jane, lingering on her face for a moment until understanding and intrigue sparks in her sharp gaze.

_“Clearly,”_ Sherlock snaps. (He knows what she’s doing, the bloody viper. It was typical Irene fashion: find out what your opponent most covets, and then obtain it so you are left holding all of the cards.) (It’s tragic, really, that he didn’t put all of the pieces of this case together sooner, having stupidly deleted her presence from his maligned youth.)

“Well, never mind. We have much more important things to discuss. So tell me: how was it done?”

“How was what done?”

“The hiker with the bashed-in head. How was he killed?”

“That’s…not why I’m here.”

“No, you’re here for the [photographs,](http://archiveofourown.org/works/914021/chapters/14975401) but that’s never going to happen, and since we’re just here chatting anyway…” She casually examines her crimson fingernails.

“That story’s not been on the news yet. How do you know about it?” Jane says suspiciously.

“I know one of the policemen. Well…I know what he _likes.”_

“So you like policemen?” Jane says pointedly.

“I like detective stories. And detectives. Brainy’s the new sexy,” she says, her voice low and sultry, reminding Sherlock of the time when he accidentally broke a jar of honey in Victor’s kitchen and Rena sucked the stickiness off one of his fingers. She had whispered some very explicit things into his ear in that same tone of voice, her honey-scented breath damp against his skin —

“Positionofthecar,” he blurts, shaking the image from his head. Jane and Irene both look at him as if he’s lost his mind. He clears his throat, trying to pull himself together. “The position of the car relative to the hiker when the backfire occurred, and the fact he was killed by a blow to the back of the head. That’s all you need to know.” Jane narrows her eyes, but he ignores her.

“You are a lot coyer than I remember,” Irene says with a slow smile. “It used to be you would never fail to use your tricks to impress a girl. Go on: tell me how he was murdered.”

“He wasn’t,” Sherlock says. Inwardly he cringes at himself for being so keen, because she is partially right on that front. He sneaks a glance at Jane however, and a warm thrill runs through him when he spots her begrudging interest.

“You don’t think he was murdered?”

“No, I _know_ he wasn’t.”

“How?” Irene says, curious despite herself, and Sherlock smirks.

“The same way I know the hiker was an accomplished sportsman recently returned from foreign travel, and that the photographs I’m looking for are in this room,” he rattles off, letting his eyes wander indifferently about the room while still scrutinising her closely. He catches the minute stiffening of her spine. (Check.)

“Okay, but how?” she says.

His gaze snaps to hers. “So they _are_ in this room. Thank you. Jane, man the door; let no one in,” he says, and she jumps up at he cue, taking her place as sentry in the hall, door closing behind her.

Alarmed, Irene sits up straight, and Sherlock _revels_ in the momentary flash of panic across her expression. He whirls around in his usual dramatic flair, and continues to pace.

“So. Two men alone in the countryside, one car, and no one else.”

“What? Oh. I thought you were looking for the photos now,” Irene says backpedaling.

“No, looking takes _ages._ I’m just going to find them,” he says, his grin feral. “You remember how we play, don’t you Rena? You’re moderately clever, and we’ve got a moment, so go on. For _old time’s sake.”_

“Oh, darling. Still miffed about that are we?”

Sherlock’s lip curls in contempt, the humiliating memory frothing to the surface before he has a chance to completely quash it. “Two men. Several yards apart. One car. It’s not hard. Apply yourself.”

Her brow puckers in a scowl and she looks off into the middle distance in concentration, and it’s been so long since he’s seen that expression a feeling similar to fondness creeps up on him. He strangles it brutally, and with a huff he marches over and yanks her up onto her feet. Before she can squawk out an indignant protest, he clamps his hands on either side of her head.

“Focus! Listen to the facts, _Irene._ Use your brain. The car,” he starts, the scene spooling out in front of his mind’s eye. (Black Saab, 1980’s model – or thereabouts – some sort of marsh or wetland up north – not important – a river flowing due east, a hiker, a backfire, a set of perfect yet anomalous conditions leading to the hiker’s death.) “The driver is trying to fix his engine in this scenario, but he’s getting nowhere.” He turns her around, hands on her shoulders and points to the ceiling as if they were out in the open air instead of the two storey town house. “And the hiker’s taking a moment, looking at the sky for something. What? Bird watching? Unlikely. But any moment now, something’s going to happen. What is it?”

“The hiker is going to die,” Irene says, looking back at him for confirmation.

He turns her around to face him again, gripping her upper arm as if admonishing a small child. “No, that’s the result. What’s going to _happen?”_

“I don’t understand,” she says, shaking his hand off.

_“Try,”_ he sneers.

“Why should I?” she parries, getting frustrated.

“Because you cater to the whims of the pathetic and take off your clothes to make an impression, now use your head and _think!_ You’ve never been one to be boring, so stop boring me now. Brainy’s the new sexy, remember?”

She wrinkles her nose, and glares defiantly at him, but eventually spins back around, angling her head back to the ceiling as if seeing what he was seeing.

“The car is going to backfire.”

“Yes. But more importantly, there is going to be a loud noise,” Sherlock emphasises.

“So what?” Irene says turning her head slightly. Her body is quite close to him, and he can feel her heat even through his thick coat she is wearing. 

“Oh, noises are important.” He encroaches on her space even more, but she doesn’t back away from the challenge. He lowers his voice directly into her ear, noticing the faint shiver passing through her. “Noises can tell you everything. For instance…”

He trails off, and at that moment the fire alarm is tripped just outside the sitting room. (Bravo, Jane.)

Irene’s eyes grow wide, and Sherlock watches as she unerringly darts a look towards the large mirror in the gilded frame above the fireplace. (Check _mate._ )

“Ah, thank you,” he says striding to the mirror. “You see, upon hearing a smoke alarm, a mother might look to her child. It’s amazing how fire exposes our priorities, don’t you think?” He feels under the ledge of the mantle and finds the hidden switch. The mirror slides up, revealing a wall safe with an electronic combination lock. “I really hope you don’t have a baby in here.”

The smoke alarm continues to blare incessantly.

“You can turn it off now Jane! Point made!” he calls, and the beeping cuts out immediately. He eyes the buttons. “You should really use gloves with these things. Heaviest oil deposits are always on the first key used — which in this case is the ‘three’ — but after that the sequence is nearly impossible to discern. From the make, it’s probably a six digit code, and we all know it can’t be your birthday. You were born in the eighties, and the ‘eight’ is barely used.”

“I’d tell you the code right now, except you don’t need me to. You already know it,” Irene says. Sherlock spins around, ready to deduce the answer out of her even though she has always been impossible to read, however he feels confident in his determination and is not above playing dirty. 

Before he gets the chance to take her apart with his sharp tongue, the door to the sitting room bursts open, and everything erupts into chaos.

Three armed men in dark suits stream into the room, one of them dragging Jane along with them. Their eyes meet, and she silently pleads an apology to him before she is roughly forced onto her knees with a gun aimed to the back of her head. Her face contorts in pain due to her shoulder, but she quickly shutters it. This makes Sherlock irrationally angry.

“Hands behind your head!” the first man (late forties, American accent, recently divorced, halitosis) barks at Sherlock, aiming the gun at his face, before swinging it back to Irene. “Get on the floor, Ms. Adler.” She lowers herself to her knees with as much dignity as she can muster.

Goon Number Three trains his gun on Sherlock, moving closer to his right side, but well out of reaching distance.

“Do you want me on the floor, too?” Sherlock asks with a bored arch of his eyebrow. 

“No, sir. I want you to open the safe.”

“American. All of you?” Sherlock scans the room, none of them confirm, but their stoic postures are answer enough. “CIA? Why does the CIA care?”

“The safe. _Now,”_ he says. Sherlock’s guard moves closer to make the point clear.

“I don’t know the code.”

“We’ve been listening, and she said that she gave it to you.”

“Well, if you really have been listening then you know that’s not true.”

“Don’t give me that,” the man says. “We have intel that says you two have a bit of a history.” Jane raises her head a little at this. “She could have told you it years ago, but the point is, you know it, and if you don’t open the safe, Mr. Archer here is going to put a bullet in Dr. Watson’s pretty head.” 

“I don’t have it,” Sherlock says through clenched teeth.

“For god’s sake, ask _her!”_ Jane grits, jerking her chin in Irene’s direction.

“Oh no, I’m not falling for that. She also knows the code that sets off the alarm, alerting the police. The _safe,_ sir.”

“Mr. Holmes doesn’t —” Irene starts.

“Shut up,” the man says, cocking the gun, just about pressing that cold steel to Irene’s forehead. “One more word out of you, and I will have no problem decorating these walls with the inside of your skull, do you hear me? On the count of three, Mr. Archer.”

_“What?”_ Jane yelps, and Mr. Archer jabs the barrel of the gun to the back of her neck.

“I don’t have the code,” Sherlock says trying to regain control. Jane looks at him, the fear expertly hidden behind a soldier’s mask, but the trust she has in him shines through the cracks.

“One.”

“I don’t know _it.”_

It isn’t working. Mr. Archer’s finger twitches over the trigger.

“Two.”

“She didn’t tell me!” Sherlock says, frantic. “I don’t know the code!”

“I’m prepared to believe you any second, now.”

Sherlock’s eyes desperately lock onto Irene’s. She subtly looks down the length of her body before snapping her gaze back to his.

_“Three.”_

“Wait!” Sherlock cries, certain he’s too late. When the gun blessedly doesn’t go off, Sherlock feels his heart start beating again, and focusses on the combination. Leave it to Irene to turn this into one massive portrait of textbook narcissism. He closes his eyes, estimating from top to bottom (bust, waist, hips) give or take a few years, and he comes up with the numbers _32, 24, 34._

He types in the first three digits, hesitating only slightly before typing in the rest. The safe beeps, and a green light blinks on indicating the lock is no longer engaged. He breathes out a small huff of relief, but it is short lived, when he notices something odd. This particular safe design typically comes with a pneumatic mechanism allowing the door to automatically pop open slightly upon unlocking. If it was dismantled somehow, it was for good reason, and one glance at Irene’s furtive expression confirms his suspicions in under a second. (Trip wire.)

“Thank you, Mr. Holmes,” the dullard of a CIA agent says still brandishing his gun. The silencer on the end is overly large for the model, and Sherlock smirks to himself. (Overcompensating, no doubt.) “Now if you would open it, we can all get on with our day.”

Sherlock nods complicity, and wraps his fingers around the handle. Taking a moment, he retreats into his Mind Palace and summons the information about hand-to-hand combat he’s learned as well as his training in baritsu.

Then, pulling a gust of air into his lungs he bellows, _“VATICAN CAMEOS!”_ and flings open the safe door.

Like he deduced, a pistol is rigged to a cord that fires the moment the door is pulled open. Allowing for this possibility, Sherlock whirls to his left, disarming his guard just as the bullet from the safe strikes dead centre, catching Mr. Archer in the chest who topples backwards and thankfully away from Jane. He spares a quick glance at her just to be sure she’s all right before swinging the confiscated pistol in his hands across his aggressor’s temple. He hits the floor like a sack of potatoes. 

In the melee, Sherlock is able to pinch the object — a camera phone with a gold plated chevron at the top — from the safe.

“Would you mind?” Sherlock drawls pointedly at Irene where she has finally managed to obtain her own weapon, and is keeping the ring leader on his knees. (Typical. Did she really find it necessary to dominate the man?)

“Of course,” Irene says with a knowing smirk, and Sherlock wonders for a moment to which she is referring. Without further ado, however, Irene brings the gun down with a solid crack against the side of the man’s head, rendering him neatly unconscious. He feels his lips twitch into the approximation of a smile.

“Archer is dead,” Jane says from across the room, getting up from her crouch over said man.

“Thanks, by the way,” Irene says to Sherlock, stepping over the pile of unconscious American at her feet. “You were very _observant.”_

“Observant?” Jane says.

“I’m _very_ flattered,” she says, skulking closer like a cat.

“Flattered?” Jane says, irritation in her tone.

“Don’t be,” Sherlock says, unscrewing the silencer from the gun in his hands. “There’ll be more of them watching the building.”

“Sherlock, we need to call the police,” Jane says.

“Yes,” he says marching to the foyer, Jane on his heels. He yanks open the front door, takes two steps, and promptly fires off five rounds into the air. “That should do it.”

“Oh for fuck’s sake,” Jane grumbles under her breath.

“What? It’s efficient,” Sherlock shrugs, making his way back into the house. He pulls her aside before reaching the sitting room, lowering his voice. “Check the rest; see how they got in.”

Clearly torn, Jane glances down the hall before nodding. “When we get home, don’t think we aren’t going to have a nice long chat about all this,” she says giving him a stern look. He nods curtly, and after a tense beat of silence between them, she heads up the stairs to the second floor. 

He watches her leave for a moment, before walking back into the sitting room. He pulls the phone out of his pocket and tosses it in the air.

“That’s mine,” Irene says turning away from where she had been peering into the empty safe.

“I don’t think so,” he says tapping the home button. A lock screen appears helpfully iterating this very fact with the phrase _I AM LOCKED,_ leaving a space for a four digit code in the middle. (No matter. Child’s play, really.) “I assume all the photographs are on here?”

“What makes you think I haven’t made copies?” she says crossing her arms and raising her chin. He saunters over to her. 

“Don’t be an idiot. You’ve clearly disabled any uplink connection because how would you ever be able to sell them unless you could prove they were unique?” Sherlock says tossing the phone once again. She makes a grab for it, but he holds it over her head.

“Who says I’m selling?” she huffs.

“A lot of people are interested in this little thing you have. Why would they be, unless you have something more incriminating on here than photos.”

The corners of her eyes tighten minutely, an expression so fleeting it would have been lost on anybody else. But not him. It’s suddenly clear that this is more than extortion; she’s afraid.

“Irene…”

“That camera phone is my livelihood, Sherlock. I can’t let you leave with it,” she says over him, holding out her hand. She tries to exude authority, but her fingers tremble.

“Rena,” he says gentling his voice, and she looks up at him, her defiance slowly chipping away. “I can’t help you unless you cooperate.”

Her lips thin into a small line, a barely there slash of red against her pale face. She swallows, “I would rather die than see that phone end up in the wrong hands. It’s — it’s my protection.”

Before he can ask her what she needs protecting from, Jane calls from the top of the stairs.

“Sherlock!”

Startled by the tone of her voice, Sherlock spares one last glance at Irene before running out of the room. He vaults up the stairs two at a time, and follows Jane’s voice into a tasteful bedroom decorated in black and white. 

Jane is crouched over the red-haired woman, Kate, taking her vitals when a gasp sounds behind him and Irene rushes to the young woman’s side.

“She’s okay,” Jane says, taking her radial pulse. “Just knocked out. They probably came in through the window.”

“Nothing she isn’t used to,” Irene tries to says casually, but her voice breaks just at the end. “There’s a back door. Better go check it, Dr. Watson.”

Jane nods, and rushes out of the room intent on securing the area like a proper soldier.

Irene rises gracefully to her feet, and walks to the squat vanity table in front of the window. She freshens up her lip stick and with a grim determination, caps the tube and puts it into one of the small drawers. 

“You’re quite calm,” Sherlock says, fiddling with the camera phone until Jane gets back. Lestrade should be here any minute, and yet she is not attempting to flee. Interesting.

“Why wouldn’t I be?” she replies, getting to her feet.

“Well, your lover has been incapacitated, the police are on their way, and your booby trap did just kill a man,” he points out.

“He would have killed me first. It was self defence…” she says, hand brushing down his arm. He turns his head to look at it. “…in… _advance.”_

As quick as a snake, Irene strikes out, jabbing something cold and sharp into his other arm while he is distracted. “What? What did you do?” he says tearing himself away from her. An empty syringe falls to the floor, and he groans when he recognises it. (Not again. _Not again._ Bloody _fucking_ hell.)

Her hand cracks across his face, connecting with the aggravated sore already on his cheek, and he stumbles back from the bracing pain. “Give it to me, Sherlock! Give me my phone!”

“No,” he grunts, falling to one knee as the room begins to spin.

“Oh, for god’s sake,” she mutters, and retrieves something from her dresser. A riding crop. She whips him with it, causing both knees to hit the floor. “I said: _give it to me!”_

“No!” he yells, trying to bock her as she rains down the blows in rapid succession striking him on the shoulder, back, neck, and face. He falls to the floor on his side, his limbs becoming loose and uncooperative despite himself. He tries to clutch the phone in his hand but his fingers feel numb, and Irene is able to slip it out of his grasp with ease.

“There. That wasn’t so hard, was it?” she asks pouting her ruby lips. “You don’t have to worry your little head about the photos. They are strictly for insurance. Besides, I might like to see that posh little thing again sometime.”

Sherlock tries to get up, but her bare foot in the centre of his chest eases him back down. She brushes the end of the riding crop over his lips. “Sh. Don’t spoil it. For old time’s sake, _ma moitié.”_ He feels his visions darken at the edges, and whimpers involuntarily as a harsh ringing takes up residence inside his head. (Sirens, maybe? Getting hard to think.)

“What the _hell_ are you doing?”

(Jane! Oh, thank god, Jane. Jane, help, don’t let her. Don’t. Jane…)

“What is this? What did you give him?”

“He’ll be fine. It’s nothing I haven’t given him before,” Irene says. She sounds further away, and he can’t get a grip on his surroundings to figure out which way she went given the whole house seems to be moving. “Just make sure if he vomits he doesn’t choke on it. It makes for a highly unattractive corpse.”

“Sherlock? Can you hear me?”

(Cool hands on face; the smell of apples chasing away Irene’s horrid perfume. Jane.)

“I was right. He _did_ remember,” Irene says.

“What do you mean?”

“The key to my safe. It’s my measurements.”

(Darkness. Want to be angry. Can’t. Everything’s so far away.)

_“Sherlock?”_

(Try to answer. Can’t. Try to move. Can’t. Try not to panic. _Can’t_ )

_“Sherlock. I’m here. I’ve got you, you’re all right.”_

(Sound of sirens. Skin is burning. Hands back on face. Cool, so cool. Smell of apples.)

_“I’m right here.”_

(Then, nothing.)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *Afters Updated!


	7. Intent

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sherlock and Jane are finally back at Baker Street after their ordeal.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello! Merry Late Christmas! I didn't exactly get to the holiday scene, because other scene ideas keep cropping up, haha. This series tends to grow exponentially, I have come to realise...hm.
> 
> Anyways. I hope all of your Christmases were wonderful. I am still wayyy behind on comments, but I am making it my goal to get to replying now that things are calming down. Hope you enjoy. I've made it as hurt/comfort-y as I could because most of you have expressed interest in the whole caring!Jane and woobie!Sherlock.
> 
> xxHoney

* * *

Jane watches the water run, paying no mind to the steam rising up around her, fogging the small kitchen window. She cringes when she hears Sherlock retching in the loo for the third time. Idly, she runs a flannel under the stream hissing when she burns her hand, and feeling like an idiot, she smacks the tap over to cold. She hears a low groan echo down the hall.

“Jane. Jane. _Jaaane.”_

“Be there in a minute, Sherlock,” she calls, wringing out the flannel and filling a glass with water for him to drink.

“’Kay,” he says. After a beat she hears him begin to sing in his low baritone — something in German by the sounds of it. He stops, tongue tripping over a string of particularly difficult words before he giggles. Jane tries not to smile, but a stoned Sherlock Holmes is really quite endearing. She shoulders open the bathroom door. “Oh, you’re back,” he sighs, grinning dopily.

She stares at him a moment, a twinge of sympathy curling up in her chest at the sight of him. His face is wan and sweaty, the bruise on his cheek where she punched him blooming a lurid purple. Because he is so pale, it looks worse than ever, and she can't help a frisson of guilt from settling in her gut. His pupils are constricted when they light on her, his eyes bright and feverish, but they light up all the same when he sees her, and for some reason this makes the guilt even worse. He’s also crammed in between the side of the tub and the toilet in a position that can’t be comfortable, one leg cramped under him, and the other stretched out in front. His bare toes wriggle, and she wonders where the hell his socks went to.

“Can you try to drink this?” she asks, sitting down on the side of the tub next to him. His eyes try to focus on the water glass she’s holding out for him, but they glaze over and he blinks fuzzily up at her. She raises her eyebrows, and he frowns at first before nodding. She has to help him drink, however, Irene’s drug doing quite a number on his basic motor skills.

God, what a nightmare this whole case was becoming. She will never forget the fear that seized her when she walked into that room and found Sherlock prone on the floor, incoherent and in pain. And that _horrible_ woman gloating her triumph over him, and then escaping through the bathroom window before Lestrade and his team managed to get there. She checked Sherlock’s pockets, but the camera phone was, of course, gone. Jane knew she could catch Irene if she followed, but the sound of her name coming from Sherlock as he struggled to remain conscious forced her to stay put and make sure he was okay.

He gripped onto her with his last remaining strength like he was drowning until he passed out. Jane could do nothing but wait for Lestrade with Sherlock’s head cradled in her lap, too afraid to leave him alone for even a second in case he had a bad reaction to the drug.

Once the paramedics were there, they were able to rouse him with an ammonia packet which was fortunate, however Jane still insisted they go to hospital to make sure. He was given a battery of tests as well as a saline drip to keep him hydrated, since the nausea started shortly after. The UA came back containing traces of ketamine laced with heroin, a nasty combination that had Jane and the doctors extremely worried it would affect his respiration. It didn’t, thank god, and he was discharged in just over an hour under the caveat of Jane’s strict supervision. The drug was wearing off, but it was slow going, and Jane has had an interesting time of it to say the least.

That reminds her that she’s going to have to get that video Lestrade recorded of a woozy Sherlock before he does something with it like put it online for the entire Met to see. Sherlock’s dignity would never recover, she’s sure.

In the meantime, Sherlock gulps the water greedily, streams of it dribbling down his chin and onto his shirt. Jane has to hold it back some, unprepared for how he tries to guzzle it outright.

“Not so fast. You’ll make yourself sick again.”

“Thirsty,” Sherlock comments after Jane takes the nearly empty glass away. He smacks his lips.

“Are you always this obvious when you’re all doped up?” she says, huffing a laugh. He hums noncommittally, tipping his head so it rests against her knee. She pats the cool flannel against his face, cleaning him up a little while they wait to see if the nausea has passed. Sure enough barely five minutes goes by before Sherlock goes rigid, the colour draining from his face leaving behind a sickly grey.

“Immabesick,” Sherlock mumbles, and lurches desperately for the toilet again.

“O-kay,” Jane croons as he attempts to vomit out his insides. She rubs soothing circles into his back. “All right.”

He stops after a minute of bringing up nothing but bile, and breathes a shaky breath out of his mouth. Jane continues to soothe him, and reaches over to flush the sour smell away.

“Is there more water?” Sherlock croaks feebly, his head on his forearm where he is still hunched over the toilet.

“Yeah, hang on.” Jane fills the glass with cool water from the sink. She helps him drink just like before, the shaking in his hands even worse from the exertion. He heeds her warning this time however, sipping at the water instead of gulping it down. He pushes it away after a moment, a pained expression coming over his face. He squeezes his eyes shut; but, the nausea seems to be lessening because he doesn’t get sick again, thank goodness.

Jane combs her fingers through his matted fringe, pushing it back so she can press the flannel to his forehead.

“Mopping my brow, are we?” Sherlock murmurs, his eyes still closed.

“Someone has to,” she replies. “You’re utterly pathetic.”

“Mm,” Sherlock hums mildly. “Feels nice.”

They sit in silence for a bit to make sure Sherlock is well and truly done throwing up. It is not a comfortable silence for Jane, however. Sitting there in the quiet bathroom, there is nothing to focus on besides her conflicted thoughts. Apparently, this Adler woman had a sordid history with Sherlock if the overzealous American CIA agents were to be believed. And the way he was acting towards her, Jane figured at least some of what they were saying had to be true. Namely, if there was any such description of the term Sexual Tension, Irene Adler and Sherlock Holmes were it. She tries to tamp down the sudden swell of her own nausea, and is about to make an excuse to leave when Sherlock heaves a gusty breath, turning his face into her denim-clad thigh.

“You were shot,” he says, words muffled.

It takes a minute for her to try and decipher what he means.

“No…Sherlock. I wasn’t. Mr. Archer never got the chance.”

“I _know._ I meant…” he says trailing off. Jane makes an inquiring noise, her hand stilling where it was lightly tracing patterns into his scalp. “At the pool,” he admits.

“The pool…? The Pool, pool?” It makes her feel ill when she realises Sherlock is still having nightmares months after the fact.

“Yes. This time the snipers shot you before I could do anything. And you —” he chokes himself off, brow pressing almost painfully into her leg.

“What, Sherlock?” she prompts, her voice hushed.

“They way you looked at me. For me to help you. It was the same way you looked at me today, and for a moment I thought I was too late. Again.”

“You weren’t, love,” Jane says, but he only shakes his head, hand coming up to grip her knee. “Come on. Let’s get up off the floor, yeah?”

It takes some creative manoeuvring, but they manage, and Jane practically helps **carry him** the short distance to his bedroom.

“You’re surprisingly strong for such a tiny person,” Sherlock comments, as he tries to make his way down the hall on rubber-band legs.

“And you’re a lot heavier for someone who hardly eats,” Jane grunts, tightening her arm about his waist.

“Are you calling me fat? I’m not fat. Mycroft’s the fat one,” he says, words slurring a bit. They shove through the door, leaning on the frame to catch their breath, and Jane fumbles along the wall for the light switch. Finally, she slaps it on and they both stare into Sherlock’s surprisingly tidy bedroom. Her eyes immediately tack onto the double bed, and she freezes.

There, folded neatly on the duvet, is Sherlock’s coat.

“Huh,” Sherlock says, staring at it likewise. “That was nice of her.”

“Yeah. _Nice,”_ Jane snaps. As much as she tries not to let it, the bitterness, and anger — and yes, okay, _jealousy_ — crawls up her spine causing her to clench her jaw. If Sherlock notices, he doesn’t say anything, and they shamble to the bed where he drops on the edge like a stone. His lips thin and he face pales even more, and he brings a shaking hand up to wipe the slight dew of sweat from his forehead. Jane assesses him, concerned. “Are you all right?”

“Yeah. Yes. Just er…” he tapers off, breathing carefully through his nose. 

She leaves him to it, and sets about getting a pair of sleep trousers, and a shirt that’s really seen better days, out of his dresser. She turns back around and huffs a breath, glaring at the greatcoat as if it personally offended her. She sets Sherlock’s pyjamas down next to him, and yanks the belstaff up by the collar as if handling a particularly disobedient dog by the scruff.

Something heavy shakes loose landing squarely on her socked foot, and she curses vividly. 

“What the hell?” She stoops to pick up the object, a large glass ashtray of all things, and she frowns at it utterly confused.

A wheezy gasp from across the room has her snapping up her head, mouth gaping in astonishment when she realises Sherlock Holmes is bloody laughing at her. Laughing.

“What is so funny? And what the hell is this doing in your coat?” she says, trying not to smile herself. Sherlock’s normally contained rolling chuckles have broken out into a high string of undignified giggles turning his face beet red from the effort. He looks completely disheveled, still swaying drunkenly where he sits, and it’s positively one of the best sights ever.

“The Palace. Remember?” Sherlock says, catching his breath. “You wanted to steal one.”

“Oh my god,” Jane says, the smile finally breaking free into a wild grin. “So you stole it for me.”

“Yep,” he says, popping the _‘p’_ at the end. “You asked me how I knew about the smoking, and as usual the facts were right under your nose.”

“This is…” Jane shakes her head, and sets the ashtray down on the bedside table, laughing until her eyes water.

“It was supposed to be your Christmas present,” he says, with a bleary yet proud expression.

She ducks her head to hide her pleased blush, and when she looks up she sees Sherlock fumbling with the buttons of his shirt with uncooperative fingers, still loopy from the drug as well as laughter.

“Here,” Jane says helping him, concentrating once again on those frustratingly tiny buttons. 

She doesn’t realise how close they are until Sherlock’s hands light on her hips, posing a tentative question in his touch. Jane stops what she is doing, hesitating only a moment before allowing herself to be drawn in, resting her own hand on the centre of his bare chest. He feels like a furnace against her palm, his heart beating strong under his smooth, ivory skin. Slowly, her hand travels up, questing fingers trailing lightly over his collar bone making him shiver at the touch, his hands flexing and moving to rest under the hem of her jumper in response. His fingertips feel hot against her bare waist making her pulse hammer wildly. She finally meets his eyes, and the breath stutters in her throat at the burning look of _intent_ on Sherlock’s face. 

Jane dips her head, resting her lips on the bruise she gave him, and his broad palms rub up and down her back as she folds herself into his embrace.

The potential is there, and they are both keen, probably have been for a while, but she knows that the circumstances are all wrong.

She holds his head against the curve of her neck for a minute, shuddering when his lips brush her throat, wanting to remain suspended like a mote of dust in that bright potential for just a little longer. Regretfully, however, the Earth keeps turning under their feet, and they are not allowed such luxuries. With great reluctance she pulls away, unable to stop herself from carding her fingers through his hair one last time.

Sherlock makes a noise of protest, but she ignores it and presses his folded pyjamas into his hands. “I’ll go get you some ibuprofen for your face.” She leaves, eyes downcast, because she knows if she looks at him, she won’t be able to stop herself from breaching that last bit of distance left between them.

Feeling a little more composed, she comes back into Sherlock’s room with the pills and another tall glass of water. By this time he’s dressed and laying on top of the duvet, head tipped back against the headboard as he stares listlessly at the ceiling.

“She’s not…” Sherlock starts. He huffs, frustrated, and tries again. “That woman is of no consequence.”

Jane carefully sits on the side of the bed, wary of the many directions this conversation can take. She really didn’t want to do this tonight of all nights. “Sherlock —”

“No, Jane,” he says. His gaze jumps to hers, intense and oh so blue in the dim light. “You have to understand. What I mean to say is, that woman doesn’t matter. _She_ doesn’t mean anything.”

Jane gives him a sad smile. He is trying so hard to convince himself of this fact that she almost goes along with him. But it’s obvious Irene Adler is an Event in Sherlock Holmes’s life that cannot simply be overlooked or discarded. Maybe at one point, but certainly not now. Forgetting is another luxury they simply cannot afford in the midst of this chaos they've landed in. They’ve come too far with each other to simply ignore this, to — to ignore the very real possibility that one of their hearts may not be as undivided as the other’s. This thought inspires a sharp pain that settles deep inside of her, and if she lingers too long over it, she knows it will consume her.

So, needing something to do in order ground herself, she resumes the familiar role of caretaker, and hands Sherlock the capsules and the water. After he has taken them, she helps him get under the blankets, smoothing them so they come up under his chin the way she knows he likes. 

He catches her wrist before she can straighten all the way up, his expression earnest. “She doesn’t, Jane. She means nothing.”

Jane shushes him, hand cupping the side of his face. “It’s okay, Sherlock.”

“It’s not,” Sherlock says, clearly torn. His distress rakes at Jane, and she touches her forehead to his. She kisses him briefly because she can’t make herself say any more useless platitudes in attempt to reassure him. Because the truth is, it’s not all right. They needed to talk — to figure out this case, and then see where the other stands in the aftermath.

He brings a hand up to twine loosely into the hair at her nape, his thumb caressing the side of her face, simply looking at her when they break apart.

 _“Stay,”_ he breathes and shuffles over, making room on the bed. “Please I — please.”

“Sherlock…” she says, not sure it’s a very good idea.

“It’s just…the dreams. I’m n-not used to them. And I don’t — I can’t —”

“Shh, I know,” Jane whispers, smoothing the hair back from his face. “It’s the least I can do, right? After all, you do the same for me.”

He doesn’t say anything, but the relief in his blurry eyes speaks volumes, and without another word she catches the light switch and slides in under the warm covers still fully dressed, and beyond caring. 

After a bit of blind fumbling, Jane manages to tuck in snugly behind Sherlock, emulating the ‘big spoon’ for once. The height difference makes things a little awkward at first, but she tangles their legs together, giving herself a bit of leverage so she can scoot up and bury her nose in the side of his neck.

Sherlock smells musky with the remnants of adrenaline and sweat, but it’s not altogether unpleasant. In fact, he smells gritty and incredibly masculine, as well as that nuanced undertone of citrus and tobacco that is uniquely him, and in the dark the combination is oddly comforting. He clutches her arm across his chest, locking her into place — as if she could even think about leaving him, anyways. He’s tense and shaking, and Jane’s heart cramps, feeling helpless in the wake of his discomfort.

“Sherlock. Relax, love,” she murmurs, trying to ease his misery.

“Trying. I hate heroin. Always have. S’why I steered clear of the stuff,” he says, groaning. She curls around him even more.

“Can you try to sleep?” she asks. He makes a doubtful noise, and grasps her hand resting over his heart. His fingers are icy, and she cups them in her warm palm trying to thaw them. An idea strikes her, and she sits up a bit. “Tell me about the hiker, then.”

“What?”

“How do you know it wasn’t murder? Detective Inspector Carter seemed convinced he was killed by our client, Phil.”

“Please,” he scoffs. “Having driven to an isolated location and successfully committed a crime without any witnesses, why would he then phone the police? Fair play?”

Jane grins in the dark. Sherlock is starting to sound a little more like himself, much to her relief. “Maybe he’s trying to be clever. Over confidence?”

“Did you even _see_ him? Were we looking at the same man?” Sherlock says, incredulous. Jane laughs, squeezing his hand. “Morbidly obese with the habits of an internet porn addict. Hardly an audacious criminal mastermind.”

“No,” Jane says, sobering. “We know when to recognise one of those, don’t we?”

Sherlock remains silent at this, causing tension to bloom between them, and Jane feels bad about the ill-timed statement. She is utterly shattered, and whatever graces she usually possesses in discerning social cues has gone completely out the proverbial window. It’s ironic, actually, that their roles seem to be reversed in this scenario. She presses her hand flat on his chest, thumb sweeping back and forth in an apology. Sherlock clears his throat.

“The stream,” he says in that tone where he knows he’s being exceptionally clever, and Jane knows she’s been forgiven for her earlier slight. “You saw it. What you didn’t see was Inspector Carter fishing the ‘murder weapon’ out of the mud.”

“Washed downstream?”

“Exactly. Now remember, he’s an accomplished sportsman recently back from traveling abroad. He’s watching the sky, but for what? The car backfires, and distracted, he takes his eyes off the object whirling in the air, forgetting that its trajectory is aiming straight for him. He has no time to rally himself before he is hit and he falls backwards, head striking a boulder, killing him almost instantly.”

“Wait…what? What was he hit with?” Jane asks.

“A boomerang,” Sherlock says, and she can practically hear his smirk.

“Fuck me,” she mutters, abashed. Sherlock chuckles sleepily, his voice rumbling like distant thunder. Slowly he starts to relax, and Jane settles in likewise. She brushes a small kiss against his shoulder, and keeps vigil until he finally does fall asleep, limbs going heavy and warm in her embrace.

Left alone with her thoughts, she tentatively lets herself believe that they will be okay regardless of all that’s transpired — that some shred of what they’ve built together will remain intact. She lets herself drift on this fragile hope until she is almost asleep herself.

Just before she succumbs to slumber, however, she is dragged back into consciousness by a strange noise piercing the silence.

Lifting her head, she spots Sherlock’s mobile on the bedside table across from them. The screen is lit, and she frowns. Just before it goes dark again, the noise — a breathy moan that causes Jane to flush with embarrassment — rings out again in the quiet.

It’s a text alert, regardless of the fact that Sherlock's phone was in his coat, and Jane goes cold with the realisation.

Irene Adler, with her leonine grace and sharp wit, wasn’t done playing her little game of cat and mouse. And no matter how hard Sherlock tried to convince her otherwise, Jane knows they won’t make it through the other side of this unscathed.

With that thought twisting around her like barbed wire, Jane falls into a dreamless, yet troubled sleep.


	8. Dark My Light

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Things once in the dark, aren't so pretty in the light...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey guys. I know it's been forever. Been dealing with health issues and RL shit. Just...bleh. Anyways! Here is this chapter, and it's quite a bit angsty, I will admit. I love your comments and encouragement, and I am quite behind on getting back to you, but I shall, I promise. Love you all. 
> 
> xxHoney

* * *

Sherlock sleeps the sleep of the dead. But it is a fraught sleep, in which his subconscious memories leak into the groundwater of his dreams like radiation.

Things he keeps behind locked doors in his Mind Palace are breaking through — twisted, nightmarish imagery combined and enhanced with the cocktail of drugs Irene flooded him with.

First there is the noise, screaming and whimpering, his brain conjuring these desperate noises from some of the more gruesome cases he’s partitioned himself from. The walls he has put in place are faltering, and flashes of corpses, their faces contorted in agony, assault him. The ones he couldn’t prevent are all there too, rattling at the bars of their cages.

He wants to scream, but he cannot…

_A cool cloth on his face, sturdy yet soft hands guiding him upright. He opens his eyes, the shadows of his room bending into menacing shapes until one of those steady hands cups his cheek, turning his head to face the sun once more._

_“Just a little water…there you are. I’m here, I’m here…”_

_He tries to hang on to that grounding presence, clumsy fingers grabbing onto the soft material of a cotton sleep shirt, twining into silky hair._

_“Hush, now. You’re all right. Try to sleep, love.”_

_He is being guided back down now, face tucked into a dark, comforting cove, the fragrant hollow of neck and shoulder. He falls._

The honey drips down the sides of the glass jar, pooling on the counter. It looks like molten gold in the sunlight.

“So, you’re the one my brother has been talking about.”

His eyes snap up to Irene’s violet ones. Her scarlet tongue curls around her finger, licking off the sticky substance.

“I suppose so,” he says, affecting a bored tone when he is, in fact, fascinated by this girl with the sharp gaze and windswept curls.

“You sure you know what you’re doing?” she asks, scooping up another glob of honey from the jar. Sherlock merely arches his eyebrow. She scoffs and sucks on her finger again, walking toward where he is leaning casually against the opposite counter in Victor’s small kitchen. “Getting involved in his… _enterprises,”_ she clarifies. She brushes up against him, and he has no where to retreat to. “Honey?” she offers.

Confused, he glances at the pot behind her. Before he has a chance to say anything, her lips are pressed to his, tacky and cloyingly sweet.

He stiffens, blinking as the kitchen around them dissolves like some demented Salvador Dali painting. He tries to struggle away from her, but she bites down on his tongue, eyes glowing, and feral. Her face contorting in fury rendering her ghoulish and terrifying.

He screams, tearing himself away, hot blood pouring down his face as the fuchsia sky above him begins to bleed. His heel catches on something as he attempts to scramble backwards, and he falls into nothingness…

_The sound of sobbing._

_Where is it…?_

_It’s coming from him. The realisation is humiliating, and yet, he can’t seem to stop himself from shaking apart as chaos swirls around him._

_He barely registers another voice breaking over him, before he is dragged under once more._

“Naughty, naughty, Sherlock.”

He whips his head around, unable to see a thing. His heartbeat thrashes in his ears.

“I’m so… _disappointed_ in you, my darling.”

Sherlock’s stomach clenches when he places the cadence of that sickening voice. _Moriarty._

He tries to move, but can’t, and to his horror, icy water begins to creep up his legs further cementing him in place.

“Better hurry, Sherlock. Tick-tock,” Moriarty’s high pitched voice mocks.

Sherlock struggles, the ever-rising water now up to mid-thigh causing him to shiver. He wants to call out, but before he can even try, the water surges up to his chest, stealing his breath.

“Jane Watson is in danger, Sherlock…best hurry!”

Then he is engulfed…

_“Jane!”_

_“I’m here, Sherlock, I’m fine. You need to relax.”_

_“Nnggh.”_

_“Shh.”_

_That cloth again, daubing his brow. It is cold and damp and reminds him of the chilly water. He flinches and tries to push it away._

_“No-o.”_

_“Sherlock, stop. Stop. I know, but I need to bring your fever down.”_

_“Cold.”_

_“I know.”_

_“Jane. Jane…”_

_“Shh.”_

There is a trail behind the Trevors’ summer home that leads into the small wood surrounding the property. Sherlock knows of it well, having spent two of his summers here. When ever the heat of the afternoon began to wane, he would follow his friend into the small forest for a bit of exploring.

However, this wood he currently finds himself in looks strange and eerie. The trees lining the path are devoid of leaves, making the stark white branches look like bone as they reach up to scrape a darkly bruised sky. The smell of ozone hangs heavy in the air, and all around him is a crackling noise, like twigs snapping in the distance, followed by the rustle of dead leaves. He can’t help but think of scales slithering over the detritus.

It puts him on edge, and he would turn around and run back from whence he came, if it weren’t for the urge to keep following the familiar figure in front of him, always three steps ahead no matter how much he lengthened his stride.

“Victor. Victor!” Sherlock says, panting as he tries to get his friend to turn around. All he can see is the back of his head, auburn locks pristine despite his tattered clothes.

 _“In a dark time the eyes begin to see…”_ comes his voice.

“What?” Sherlock says, reaching out a hand, only to miss his shoulder as Victor trudges ever forward.

_“I meet my shadow in the deepening shade.”_

“Stop. Will you stop for a _moment,_ Victor?” His calves begin to throb with the strain as the path below his feet becomes gnarled with tree roots and sharp rocks, making the pace he is trying to keep impossible.

 _“That place among the rocks — is it a cave or winding path?”_ Suddenly the scenery changes, and Victor comes to an abrupt halt at the precipice of a jagged cliff. Sherlock gasps, losing his footing to the slippery rock, and landing hard on one knee. Victor, his back still to Sherlock, points out across the sea to the horizon. Sherlock squints into the foetid yellow sun as it casts a putrid glow over the churning waters. _“The edge is what I have!”_ He takes a step, and the edge of the cliff begins to crumble.

“Don’t!” Sherlock yells, struggling to his feet. He tries to run to his friend, but it is too late as Victor opens his arms wide and flings himself into the abyss…

_Sherlock opens his eyes._

* * *

Sherlock wakes with a panicked gasp, rousing Jane from her doze. Her fingers automatically tighten on the nape of his neck, kneading soothingly into the tension. 

“Shh,” she murmurs, sifting her hand through his matted hair.

After the last nightmare where Sherlock had been delirious with fever and despair, she had managed to calm him down enough to take some paracetamol, and he had curled up on his side, head in her lap and an arm wrapped around her legs. She is sat upright against the headboard, an ideal position for her to continue to soothe him, but not so ideal for sleeping, if the kink in her spine is any indication. She remains still however, her fingers lightly grazing his scalp as his muscles remain taut.

She holds her breath, waiting to see just how lucid he really is this time, projecting a sense of calm and safety that hopefully pierces through the haze.

About a minute goes by before Sherlock uncoils somewhat, breathing hard. From distress or relief, or both, Jane doesn’t know.

“Hey,” she intones, not wanting to shatter the silence of early morning. Sherlock continues to gulp in air, his right arm tightening around her knees as if afraid she would vanish. “I’m not going anywhere.”

“Mhm,” he acknowledges. His hold doesn’t let up, however. 

It’s another minute before Jane registers the damp spots seeping into her track bottoms, and winces inwardly when she realises it’s from Sherlock’s silent tears.

“All right, love?” she whispers, brushing the hair back from his temple. In the dimness of pre-dawn she sees that his eyes are squeezed tightly shut. She catches the glimmer of a tear as it slides across the bridge of his nose to join the others gathered beneath his cheek.

“B-bad trip,” he grits out, trying to smooth his jagged breathing.

“Not much longer now,” Jane says. “The worst seems to have passed.”

Sherlock hums again, his vice-like grip slackening somewhat. He turns his head so his face is pressed into her thigh and lets out one last shuddering breath. She reaches down with the hand not occupied with Sherlock’s curls, and eases the fabric of her trouser leg out of his fist. He latches on to her hand instead, and she squeezes back.

“This is real?” he asks.

She closes her eyes at how much her heart aches for him. “Yes,” she says bending to press a kiss into his hair. He turns his head so his face isn’t hidden any more, and she kisses him on the crest of his cheekbone. “I promise. Go to sleep.”

Sherlock sighs, nestling further under the covers, his head still on Jane’s lap, and it’s no time at all before he drops off into slumber once more.

***

Jane must have fallen asleep herself, but at what point, she’s not sure. Because the next thing she knows, she’s waking up alone to dewy yellow sunlight streaming through Sherlock’s window, somehow snuggled under his downy coverlet. She pushes herself upright with a muffled groan, her head pounding with residual exhaustion. She could seriously do with another few hours of sleep, but she forces herself out of bed. 

On Sherlock’s bedside table, Jane spots a set of clothes neatly folded, her phone sitting on top, and her eyebrows rise of their own accord. It is uncommonly considerate of her flatmate, the likes of which immediately draws up a red flag. It goes against what she expects from him, and the gesture, while sweet, strikes her as cautious. Too cautious.

She pulls the black and white striped jumper over her head, followed by her comfortable jeans, trying to shake the feeling of unease. 

The feeling only intensifies when she can hear irate voices out in the sitting room.

“You are _impossible,_ Sherlock Holmes,” Mycroft says, cheeks taking on an uncharacteristic flush indicating just how agitated he is. Sherlock, impeccably dressed despite his blue robe sneers at his older brother, and Jane takes a seat as unobtrusively as she can across from him at their breakfast table. She would have to ask why their table is currently in the sitting room and not in the kitchen, later, but thinks maybe she doesn’t want to know given the possible gruesome reasons behind it. After all, it wasn’t too long ago she found a decapitated head in their fridge.

“Relax,” Sherlock says, scrolling through something on his phone. He doesn’t acknowledge Jane as she sits down. “Your photographs are perfectly safe.”

“In the hands of a _fugitive sex worker!”_ Mycroft iterates. Mrs. Hudson chooses that moment to bustle in with a tea service, pointedly clearing her throat, and Mycroft adjusts his collar.

She exchanges a quick ‘good morning, dear’ with Jane, before making her way to the kitchen. _Brave woman,_ Jane thinks, gratefully reaching for a cup.

“She’s not interested in blackmail, she wants…protection from something. Someone,” he amends. He puts down his phone, and flicks open a newspaper. “I take it you’ve stood down the police investigation into the shooting at her house?”

“We can’t do anything without the photographs. Our hands are tied.”

“She would applaud your choice in words, Mycroft. That phone is her ‘Get Out of Jail Free’ card. You have to leave her alone, or she’ll spill. Treat her like royalty.”

“Although…” Jane says, tying her hair back. “Not the way _she_ treats royalty.”

Sherlock scoffs, and for the first time that morning, meets her eyes, a smirk playing on his lips. Before she can say anything else, however, that breathy orgasmic exhalation sounds from Sherlock’s phone, causing the moment to dissolve. Sherlock hurriedly looks away, snatching up his mobile.

“What was that?” Jane says, even though she knows perfectly well.

“Mm?” Sherlock says, keeping one eye on the screen. “And anyway, Mycroft. What even was that steaming load of tripe back there?”

“I’m afraid I don’t know what you mean,” he sniffs, eyeing Mrs. Hudson as she brings out two plates of soldiers and rashers and setting them down in front of her respective tenants. Jane’s stomach grumbles appreciatively, and she picks up a fork.

“Bollocks. You don’t actually mean to tell me you didn’t know that people were after her. CIA-trained killers, to top it all off. And you sent Jane and me straight into the fire,” he says, referring to Jane as if she isn’t even in the room. _Splendid._

“Thanks for that,” she mutters darkly, not sure who she’s actually addressing at this point.

“Really, Mycroft Holmes. Sending your little brother into danger like that,” Mrs. Hudson says, topping off Jane’s cuppa. “It’s a disgrace; family’s all we have in the end.”

“Oh _do_ shut _up,_ Mrs. Hudson!” Mycroft growls, finally at the end of his patience.

Jane’s temper flares, and she yells an indignant _“Oi!”_ at the same time Sherlock barks a furious, “MYCROFT!”

The British Government startles, blinking rapidly as he takes in the disapproving tableau before him. Chagrined, he tugs at his collar again. “Apologies, Martha.”

Mrs. Hudson nods, bestowing him with a magnanimous smile, which is more than the ponce deserves, in Jane’s opinion. She pats his arm, “Thank you, dear.”

The tension is still thick in the air until Sherlock breaks it with his usual snooty remark of, “Though do, in fact, shut up,” and continues to eye the paper. Mrs. Hudson shakes her head fondly at him, oblivious to the awkwardness still lingering in the air.

And if that isn’t bad enough, Sherlock’s phone chimes in with that lewd _“Unnh…!”_ making Mrs. Hudson gasp a little in shock.

“That’s a bit rude, that noise. Isn’t it?” she says, flushing a little. Her hands fluttering, she clears away Jane’s half-eaten breakfast. She’s definitely lost her appetite.

Sherlock makes a good show of ignoring his mobile, and instead picks up the previous thread of conversation. “There’s nothing you can do, and nothing she can do either. Or will do, I might add.”

“I can put maximum surveillance on her.”

“Like you haven’t already,” Sherlock snorts. “Besides, why bother? You can follow her on Twitter. I believe her user name is ‘TheWhipHand,’ no spaces.”

Mycroft’s phone trills angrily from his breast pocket. “Yes, most amusing. Pardon me,” he says with a distasteful grimace, excusing himself while he takes the call. Sherlock tracks him suspiciously as he wanders out into the hall.

“Why does your phone make that noise?” Jane says, disrupting his scrutiny. The only indication she gets that she has, in fact, disrupted his concentration is the slight flare of his nostrils because he still won’t acknowledge her. It’s getting to be ridiculous, actually. “ _Sher_ lock.”

He tears himself away from glaring at his brother, and resumes reading through the paper. “What noise?” he says, shoving aside his untouched plate for Mrs. Hudson to clear away.

_“Unnh…!”_

He cringes. Just barely, but Jane spots it. “ _That_ noise,” she says almost cruelly.

“Text alert. Means I’ve got a text,” he stonewalls.

“Funny,” Jane says, her tone anything but amused. “Your texts usually don’t make that noise.”

“Someone must have changed it. As a joke, perhaps.”

“So that any time they text you —”

_“Unnh…!”_

“Could you turn that down?” Mrs. Hudson says, gathering up Sherlock’s plate and mug. “At my time of life it’s just not decent.” Jane continues to stare at him as she hurries away.

It’s irritating because she knows _he_ knows she’s glaring at him, and yet he still refuses to look at her.

“I’m not stupid, you know,” she says quietly, some of the fight going out of her. He balks, opalescent eyes flicking over her face before settling on a spot over her shoulder.

“What ever gave you that idea?” he says flatly. She chooses to forge ahead regardless of that encouraging invitation.

“Listen, what happened yesterday —”

“Does not bear repeating,” Sherlock says, jumping to his feet. Not willing to let him run away, Jane’s on her feet too, grabbing his wrist.

“Yes. It does. We need to talk about things, Sherlock. We need —”

Abruptly, he twists his arm out of her grasp, and all at once the force of his gaze slams into her.

 _“We_ don’t need to do anything. _I_ don’t _need_ to do anything,” he snarls.

“Yeah. Sure. Everything’s perfect, is it?” Jane hisses back. “I’ve just spent half the night up with you, listening to you shout out all kinds of terrible things, and you think there’s nothing to talk about?”

“Nobody asked you to!” Sherlock bites, scuffing a hand through his hair. Stunned, Jane takes a step back.

“What?”

 _“Nobody asked you to be there._ Least of all _me,”_ he says. His face is twisted into such an awful expression fury, and Jane has the sudden image of a wild animal caught in a snare, lashing out fiercely at anyone trying to help. She is hurt by this — by his obvious pain. But she is hurt even more by his words, knocked off balance by the sudden concussion of his anger. A vacuum opens up between them, filled only with the sound of her pounding heart.

“Bond Air is go; it’s been decided,” Mycroft’s voice floats into the sitting room, and Sherlock snaps his attention towards him, releasing Jane from his immutable gaze. She feels weak in the wake of it. “Check with the Coventry lot. Talk later,” he says, strolling back into the sitting room. Sherlock is on him in an instant.

“What else does she have?”

“I don’t —”

“Irene. _What else does she have?”_ Mycroft arches and inscrutable eyebrow much to Sherlock’s frustration. “Come on, the Americans wouldn’t be interested in her for a few compromising photographs. There’s more. _Much_ more. Something big is coming, isn’t it?”

Mycroft regards him, countenance as cool as ever. “That Adler woman is no longer any of your concern. From now on you will stay out of it.”

 _“Will_ I?” Sherlock challenges.

“Yes,” Mycroft says sharply. The brothers face off silently for a beat, before Mycroft finally breaks eye contact and slips his mobile into the pocket of his waistcoat. “Now, if you will excuse me.” He nods, and turns swiftly on his heel without further ado.

Sherlock growls, marching over to the table and grabbing the first thing he can, Jane’s mug of tea, and hurtles it at the wall with a bellow.

“Sherlock Holmes!” Mrs. Hudson admonishes rushing into the sitting room.

“LEAVE!”

Mrs. Hudson yelps a little, and with a disapproving huff, scurries away.

“Well done, you,” Jane says, suddenly too numb to really care.

“God, I can’t bloody think!” he rages. “Stupid, arrogant bastard barring me from this case!”

“Yep. Good luck with that,” she says, making for the door.

“Where are you going?” he says, grabbing her shoulder, her bad one, as she walks past. She shouts in pain, throwing him off.

“I’m going to apologise to Mrs. Hudson, if you must know,” she says rounding on him, her anger renewed. He looks at her wide-eyed, for once finally seeing her. “And no, Sherlock, nobody asked me to, so God knows why I even bother. But she is a good woman, and treats you like her own, so the least I can do is go and make sure she’s all right, because loving you is no easy task, _and I should bloody well know!”_ she finishes, cheeks flushed, and trembling with rage. She distantly registers what she’s just said, but doesn’t give a flying fuck at this point.

“Jane,” he says weakly, face paling.

“Don’t!” she says, holding up a hand, and flees before the panic can fully settle in.

She slams the door as hard as she can, having had the last word for once. However, she doesn’t feel triumphant in the least when the only thing echoing inside her is emptiness.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _In a dark time, the eye begins to see,_  
>  I meet my shadow in the deepening shade;  
> I hear my echo in the echoing wood—  
> A lord of nature weeping to a tree.  
> I live between the heron and the wren,  
> Beasts of the hill and serpents of the den.
> 
>  
> 
> _What’s madness but nobility of soul_  
>  At odds with circumstance? The day’s on fire!  
> I know the purity of pure despair,  
> My shadow pinned against a sweating wall.  
> That place among the rocks—is it a cave,  
> Or winding path? The edge is what I have.
> 
>  
> 
> _A steady storm of correspondences!_  
>  A night flowing with birds, a ragged moon,  
> And in broad day the midnight come again!  
> A man goes far to find out what he is—  
> Death of the self in a long, tearless night,  
> All natural shapes blazing unnatural light.
> 
>  
> 
> _Dark, dark my light, and darker my desire._  
>  My soul, like some heat-maddened summer fly,  
> Keeps buzzing at the sill. Which I is I?  
> A fallen man, I climb out of my fear.  
> The mind enters itself, and God the mind,  
> And one is One, free in the tearing wind.
> 
>  
> 
> \--Theodore Roethke


	9. Inexorably

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jane and Sherlock dance around each other and their issues.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey there loves. So yes, this update was a lot sooner. I am trying to focus on this a little more diligently because I really want to progress with this series. I am going to try and catch up on 'Afters' as well because I am uber behind. You're comments are lovely, and so are the tremendous amounts of kudos I keep getting! Hearts for all of you as well my dears!
> 
> xxHoney

* * *

After Jane skulked away to hide in Mrs. Hudson’s flat, Sherlock slammed out of 221 a moment later, the street door banging so hard, some of the plaster shook free from Mrs. Hudson’s walls. Silence resounded in the small kitchen so profound it was suffocating. Jane tried really hard, she did, but when the last remnants of adrenaline and shock finally ebbed out of her, her eyes prickled, and she had no choice but to bury her head in her arms right there at Mrs. Hudson’s table. She didn’t cry, but it was a near thing.

And because **Mrs. Hudson** was a saint, she simply stroked Jane’s tangled hair, and set a steaming mug of tea in front of her, and when Jane tried to apologise on behalf of both her and Sherlock, she wouldn’t hear of it, and instead suggested they watch terrible telly on her chintz sofa.

Sherlock didn’t come home that night. Or the night after. And Jane would have been driven spare with worry had he not at least answered her text messages. No matter how many times she asked, he wouldn’t tell her where he had gone, only that he was _‘Fine, Jane,’_ and _‘Busy.’_ Always busy.

She stopped pestering him, and instead texted Greg and Molly to keep an eye out for him just as a precaution, knowing that if he really wanted to vanish, he would have done so.

It was a relief to say the least, that on the third day early in the morning, Jane finally heard his familiar tread on the stairs, and the hushed click of his bedroom door, allowing her to finally get some much needed sleep.

However, even though Sherlock didn’t exactly vanish, the proceeding week and a half of sheer avoidance from him made it feel like she was sharing a flat with a ghost.

Each morning she would wake up to the sight of Sherlock’s bedroom door being closed, and would head off to the surgery without seeing hide nor hair of him. Then, when she would return home, it was to an empty flat until she would cart herself off to bed, unable to close her eyes until she heard him sneak up the stairs.

Her text messages and attempts to talk to him went unheeded as if he figured the little bits of evidence he left around the flat — an empty mug in the sink, his coat flung over her armchair, a new case file from Lestrade that she apparently wasn’t privy to — was enough for her to ascertain his status, thereby negating the need for a response from him. Which made her feel really quite awful.

She felt she was being punished, but she would be damned if she would apologise. She couldn’t apologise for something that was the truth, after all, whether he wanted to accept it or not.

Besides, she was punishing herself just fine as it was. 

Even though she wasn’t sorry for loving Sherlock, she cursed the way she went about telling him. Of course he would pull the most infuriating disappearing act known to man after that outburst. Especially after being drugged to the gills, and humiliated by a former — _friend? lover? dead best friend’s sister?_ — whatever she was, only hours before. And if there was one thing Jane has learnt, it’s that Sherlock Holmes doesn’t do vulnerability particularly well.

And so, here she is, twelve odd days later, staring blankly down at their table, completely uninspired by her reheated pasta, in a much too quiet flat, wondering what to do with herself. She pulls out her mobile.

_Sent – 6:16 PM_  
_where are you?_

She waits for a reply that typically doesn’t come.

_Sent – 6:31 PM_  
_sherlock?_

The pasta has congealed at this point, and to reheat reheated leftovers is probably a health hazard at the very least, so she gets up to toss it, appetite gone. She sits in her armchair with intentions of reading her current romance novel when the feeling of abject foreignness strikes her. 

She feels like a stranger in her own flat; like the familiarity of the place she once called home has abandoned her. She suddenly realises how much of 221B belongs to Sherlock, and how little of it actually belongs to her. All she has is what she moved in with; a footlocker’s worth of stuff, and the meager wardrobe she’s had for the past seven years, and for the first time, she feels completely out of place. As if she was tacked on as an afterthought — tawdry and easy to replace. It turns her stomach, and she pulls out her phone once more, fingers trembling.

_Sent – 6:53 PM_  
_do you want me to move out?_

The reply chimes only seconds later, and it makes her heart lurch. She almost doesn’t want to look at it, but forces herself to anyway.

_Sherlock Holmes – 6:54 PM_  
_Where the blazes did you get that idiotic idea? SH_

The response is typically insulting and infuriating in equal measure, imperious yet petulant, and she feels absolutely sick at the sheer relief that it inspires. She laughs instead of vomiting, however, and she considers it a minor success.

“Gee, I don’t know, you _colossal. arse._ Maybe because you’ve been hiding from me for a bloody fortnight!” she says out loud, shaking from the sudden giddiness within her. She wants to grin but she schools her face into one of anger, on principle.

_Sent – 6:59 PM_  
_deduce._

_COLOSSAL ARSE – 7:01 PM_  
_I’ve been busy. SH_

Jane wants to smash her face into a pillow and scream herself raw at that infuriating response, but she takes to pacing instead. She didn’t realise how on the verge of panic she was until it was abruptly defused, leaving her with an excess of manic energy, and the feeling of ants marching all over her skin. She bites the inside of her cheek.

_Sent – 7:03 PM_  
_busy avoiding me._

There. She’s said it. And yes it really does sound as petty as she thought it would, but she doesn’t care.

_COLOSSAL ARSE – 7:12 PM_  
_I needed to think. It’s hard to think about this case with you around. SH_

_Sent – 7:13 PM_  
_what case? the one from lestrade?_

_COLOSSAL ARSE – 7:13 PM_  
_No. The woman’s case. The Woman, woman. SH_

Wait. Irene Adler?

_Sent – 7:14 PM_  
_thought you were barred._

_COLOSSAL ARSE – 7:14 PM_  
_Obviously, or I would have solved it by now. SH_

_Sent – 7:17 PM_  
_but you’re still thinking about it._

_COLOSSAL ARSE – 7:17 PM_  
_Yes. Or trying to, anyway. SH_

She thinks she really will scream this time. Or shoot holes in the wall. She is just about at that threshold.

_Sent – 7:19 PM_  
_again that brings me back to my question: do you want me to leave?_

_COLOSSAL ARSE – 7:20 PM_  
_Stupidity isn’t becoming of you, Jane. SH_

_Sent – 7:20 PM_  
_sherlock I swear to god. it’s a simple question. one I really need a direct answer for._

_COLOSSAL ARSE – 7:21 PM_  
_No. SH_

_Sent – 7:22 PM_  
_no?_

_COLOSSAL ARSE – 7:22 PM_  
_No. SH_

_COLOSSAL ARSE – 7:22 PM_  
_No, I do not wish you to leave. SH_

_COLOSSAL ARSE – 7:22 PM_  
_Moving or otherwise. SH_

_COLOSSAL ARSE – 7:22 PM_  
_I wish for you to remain at Baker Street. SH_

_COLOSSAL ARSE – 7:22 PM_  
_I wish for you to remain as my flatmate. SH_

_Sent – 7:23 PM_  
_allright. I get it._

_COLOSSAL ARSE – 7:23 PM_  
_And any and all variations of my want of you staying that apply. SH_

Jane drops into her armchair again, head in her hands, and breathes heavily for a moment. She feels a bit dizzy, that oppressive shadow pressing down on her windpipe suddenly lifted, causing the oxygen to flood back into her lungs. The sensation is almost painful. She was more terrified than she would admit that his answer was going to be yes.

She wipes a trembling hand over her face.

“Right,” she says, determined, and reaches for her coat. She needs to get out.

It only takes fifteen minutes of ambling around the nearest high street before Jane realises simply taking a walk isn’t doing it for her. She needs a goal; a purpose. Something to do.

She is so lost in her thoughts that she doesn’t notice the man and his small daughter with sunshine curls standing just outside a shop front window until she accidentally bumps into him.

“Sorry!” she says.

“No worries, luv,” the man says cheerily, and she gives him a rueful nod and a smile.

The little girl pipes with a sweet, “Merry Christmas!” and it isn’t until Jane turns the corner when it dawns on her that Christmas, is in fact, only a week away. 

The realisation is like a thunderbolt, and she stops dead in her tracks.

She doesn’t know how it slipped her mind so completely, especially with her mum calling every few days to see if she is coming to their big house out in Surrey. She’s shoved it off, letting almost every one of those calls go into voice mail. It’s terrible of her, she knows, but after last Christmas, it’s probably best if she were to visit at a later date. Send a card, or her gift through the post like usual —

 _Shit._ Christmas is only a week away and she hasn’t even _begun_ her shopping.

Well, there’s a mission if she ever needed one, and without a second to spare, she ducks into the nearest open shop, hoping to tic a few people off her list tonight.

***

It is possible that Jane would admit to getting a bit carried away now that she thinks back on it. She looks down at the dozen or so bags in her hands, and figures it will be a lot quicker to just get a cab.

See, the problem with an idle soldier, is they will take to any mission presented to them with quite a bit of frevour, often diving head first into the task with a single-mindedness that’s been ingrained in them. And a soldier without a commanding officer has a hard time knowing when to stop.

This time is no different, and in her head the idea of a Christmas do at Baker Street was completely in order.

Now, though, she’s not entirely sure. Because, of course, finding gifts for her friends, led to finding gifts for Mrs. Hudson, led to her wanting to cook Christmas dinner, which of course evolved to needing to find decorations for the flat, until eventually it just made sense to make a…thing out of it all. And now…well. She might have blown through this months paycheque, but at least there will be wine and pudding and hopefully cheer.

Well. Maybe not cheer from everyone.

She smirks when she thinks of the felt antlers she picked up on a whim, and about the ways she can trick Sherlock into wearing them.

The thought vanishes, however, when she remembers why she did all this to distract herself in the first place. Who knows if he would even be there for the party? It’s not something she thinks he would go for even if things weren’t tense between them.

The taxi pulls up to 221B just as she’s second guessing the entire thing, and she looks down at the forest of plastic bags at her feet in dismay. The cabbie clears his throat when she takes too long, mentally kicking herself. There’s really nothing for it, and after she pays the driver, she picks her chin up and decides she’s going to stand by her plan, and to hell with disapproving and bah-humbug flatmates.

Of course Himself is actually in the flat for once when she gets there. Of all the times he could have chosen to come home, it had to be now. _Figures._

 _“Where_ have you been?” Sherlock says, assaulting her when she walks into the sitting room.

“Funny, coming from you,” she remarks, sarcastically. “Don’t worry, I’ve got it.” She lugs the bags into the kitchen, shoving past him. He’s not deterred.

“You didn’t respond to my texts!”

“Again: hilarious.” She dumps the foodstuffs and other sundry on the counter.

“Did you not get them?” he says, ignoring her wry tone.

“Oh, I’m sure I did,” she says, cavalier, and pulls out her mobile. Sure enough there are thirteen new text messages. “Look at that.”

“You left!” Sherlock yells, gesticulating madly with one hand while the other clenches a fistful of hair. “You left in the middle of a conversation that had very confusing signals —” and Jane makes a noise of outrage here, because really? Mixed signals? _Her?_ “and then proceed to drop off the bloody radar!”

“Sherlock,” Jane starts, temper simmering.

“You _left!”_ he says again, eyes like two feral shards, cutting and sharp. The accusation is still tinged with old bitterness, and all at once Jane realises they are arguing about something else entirely. It’s apparent Sherlock is _still_ angry about this summer — about the much needed distance between them she single-mindedly implemented. A form of damage control after the whole Moriarty incident. After all these months, for him to still be harbouring resentment towards her makes her temper finally snap. She slams her hands down on the worktop with an almighty bang.

“BUT I CAME BACK!” she explodes, whirling around and crowding into his space. “Always! _I always come back!”_ She doesn’t realise she has fisted her hands in the lapels of his suit jacket until she is forced to take stock of the situation in the deafening silence. She releases him, eyes darting away from his stricken expression. She pinches the muscle between her brows. Then weakly, “And sometimes I don’t even know why.”

She can hear Sherlock inhale sharply as she is moving past him. He blocks her path so she is forced to stop.

“Jane, I…” he trails off, eyes pinched miserably at the corners. He searches her face, but can’t seem to find anything more to say.

“Just — forget it. All of it,” she says dully, suddenly shattered. “It’s late. I need to get some sleep.”

“Please,” he murmurs, taking another step towards her. His face filled with such despondent confusion gives her pause, and for a moment neither of them looks away despite the bruising their gazes leave behind on one another. The air is thick with tension, pivotal between them almost, as if the room itself is holding its breath to see which of them makes the first move.

A moment later, the choice is taken from them both when Sherlock’s mobile groans its obnoxious, _“Unnh…!”_

Sherlock closes his eyes briefly, before reaching for his trouser pocket. Jane takes this as her cue, and dodges around him before he can stop her. She makes it to her room, her back pressed to the door, and she holds her breath when she hears him on the stairs, not even bothering to avoid the creaky fourth one, intent on following her. 

Then, that damn text alert goes off once more, and his ascent stops. She listens intently, and with a sharp pain she hears him turn around — moving away from her, inexorably away — and the distance feels like an ice pick between her lungs. Her breath shudders out of her.

Mechanically she dresses for bed, trying not to think, stripping off her jeans and jumper until she’s down to just pants and an old sleep shirt. The sheets are crisp and cold and smell clean, almost clinical, no trace of warmth, or aftershave, or marble skin, or ebony curls. Only wholly of her own shampoo and laundry detergent.

She listens to her heart thrum in her veins, and ignores the dampness on her pillow as she struggles toward sleep.

In the morning, the sorrow is still buzzing around in her head making her feel almost dizzy with it. Her throat burns with the thought of going downstairs to an empty flat, because she really couldn’t give herself that vicious hope that he would actually be here after last night. Boy, she really did show her hand, didn’t she?

She winces when she remembers just where she’d heard the sentiment in the first place.

_‘You’ve rather shown your hand there, little Sparrow.’_

Jane shudders, feeling ill, and tears her way out of the bedclothes. She feels suffocated in her small room, and hastily throws on her dressing gown. God, she needs tea. Gallons of it.

The sitting room is empty, the fact she is alone apparent, and with a pang, Jane tries to ignore it by not glancing at the sofa or Sherlock’s chair, hardly batting an eye lash at the kitchen table devoid of experiments for once.

However, when she reaches for the kettle, she finds her breath catching in her throat. There, on the handle, is a little white note in Sherlock’s atrocious scrawl:

_Went to NSY to give Lestrade back his files. I’ve taken the liberty of purchasing a new pint of milk as we seemed to be out. Also, there are fermented tongues in the fridge. DON’T TOUCH._

Bewildered, Jane shuffles over to the fridge to confirm that yes, Sherlock Holmes did indeed buy some milk, and to top it all off in a rare stroke of consideration, has even placed the bag of what is undoubtedly the aforementioned tongues on a tray to prevent dripping.

It is still much too cautious for her liking. This constant egg-shell avoidance of his, but for the moment it is more from him than she would have hoped for.

Bemused, she makes her cup of tea and hunts for her phone.

In the midst of her panicked escape, she left it on the table along with the stuff she picked up yesterday. It’s not where she remembers leaving it, and after a minute of searching, she finds it on the desk, merrily charging itself with one of Sherlock’s extra chargers he keeps lying about the flat.

She sighs, taking the tentative peace offering for what it is and opens the text app.

_Sent – 8:06 AM_  
_thank you._

_COLOSSAL ARSE – 8:07 AM_  
_You’re welcome. Be back this evening. SH_

Jane feels a little of the tension drain out of her. They were okay, at least for now. And Jane would take what she could get, even if it means this awkwardly cordial interaction.

_Sent – 8:10 AM_  
_all right. chinese for dinner?_

_COLOSSAL ARSE – 8:10 AM_  
_Sounds good. SH_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh, these two. Sheesh. Next chapter should be the Christmas chapter! And things might get a bit steamy in the near future so keep an eye on the rating, possibly. But, I really am not a smut writer so don't expect anything too graphic.


	10. Christmas

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A gift, and a surprise.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh MYLANTA you guys. So my computer is officially dead, and I am currently posting this at the library for you. Because of that I have two whole chapters for you. So hooray, right? I am so sorry this has been so long on this story, but Merry Christmas in July, and I love you all.
> 
> xxHoney

* * *

Sherlock glares out the window, violin resting down by his side, bow grasped tightly in his hand. The fairy lights wreathing the window are actually giving him a headache, and he wants nothing more than to seclude himself in his room away from all the… _festive cheer._ He’s tried to do so twice, in fact. But every time he makes it half way across the room or into the kitchen, he somehow always ends up on the other end of one of Mrs. Hudson’s disapproving glares as if she knows exactly what he’s up to. She can be observant at the most inconvenient times, honestly.

“Oh, Sherlock! That was beautiful. I do wish you would wear the antlers, though!” Mrs. Hudson trills, her cheeks ruddy. Sherlock clenches his jaw, tamping down the swell of irritation.

“Some things are best left to the imagination, Mrs. Hudson,” he replies curtly, swirling around. His eyes land on the screen of the laptop over Jane’s shoulder where she’s been sitting doing last minute up-dates to her blog. What’s so important that her readers must be informed of right as it happens, he doesn’t know, but he notices the hit counter on the page still reads _1895._ He almost dismisses the detail, but something sparks in his mind and struggles to ignite. (Maybe —) “Jane!”

“Hm?” she says, getting up from the desk chair and reaching for Mrs. Hudson’s empty cider cup.

“The counter on your blog still reads one thousand eight hundred ninety-five.”

“What?” she mock-gasps, “Well in that case, cancel Christmas!”

Sherlock frowns at her tone, which is more scathing than normal. She seems to pick up on it too, and grimaces before hastily flicking her gaze away. He knows things have been…difficult between them, their easy loping harmony juddering to a halt. They no longer flowed around each other, each waiting, stilted and awkward for the other to make a move. There was a time when entire conversations could be held with a single glance between them, but now, Sherlock can admit to being constantly bewildered by her expressions, and her half-aborted words and gestures are a mystery. (And he’s supposed to be a bloody expert on these things, for chrissake!) He glares back down at the computer screen.

“But it —”

“Give it a rest, Sherlock. Take a day off!” Lestrade says clapping him on the back. “Have a snifter, or two.”

“Or seven,” mutters Jane, as she hands Mrs. Hudson a replacement glass. Before Sherlock can reply with a scathing comment to either of them, a knock sounds at the door.

“Merry Christmas!” And Sherlock scowls even harder as that whatshisname — Sherman something — bumbles into the flat, tugging off his damp gloves with his teeth like a philistine.

“Who invited you?” Sherlock sneers.

“I did,” Jane says, helping the buffoon out of his garish yellow pea coat. “Here, let me take that, Stephen.” (Ha! _Stephen._ What a pathetically common name. Knew it started with an ‘S’.)

“Ho-Ho-Ho! I brought wine!” he says jovially, holding up said vintage, cheeks ruddy and smile much too jolly for him _not_ to be taken as an imbecile.

“Oh! Are we having our Christmas drinkies, then? Sorry I’m late,” says Molly, entering right behind Mr. Holiday Glee. She hands off her winter coat to Jane as well, revealing a form-fitted black number with thin straps and glittering beaded appliqué atop the bosom. 

Mr. Christmas Cheer ogles and nearly drops the wine, and even Lestrade has to close his mouth.

“W-Would you like some wine, Miss? Or some spiced cider?” Mr. Yuletide Spirit (it is here when Sherlock realises he’s suddenly picked up Jane’s penchant for tawdry nicknames, and cringes) stammers inelegantly. “Or perhaps you would like to start with —”

“Maybe you should start with her name,” Sherlock scathes, loosening his violin bow with a savage twist of the screw. The inanity surrounding him on all sides makes his skin crawl.

“Sherlock —” Jane warns.

The two Clandestine Turtledoves (oh god it won’t stop) blush, and fumble over awkward introductions, and polite small talk, and it’s all so precious Sherlock just wants to vomit.

“Why don’t I take this and let it breathe for a bit, yeah? That way you can…get to know each other,” Jane says, taking the wine with a smug glint to her eye. Sherlock slams the lid of his violin case shut with a snap. (She planned this, he just knows it.)

“So, er, Miss Hooper — it is _Miss,_ correct?”

“Oh, god,” Sherlock bemoans.

“Yes…just Miss,” Molly says, setting the paper bag she brought at her feet. She subtly tries to scoot it behind the red armchair, which only causes it to topple over, brightly coloured packages spilling across the floor. “Oh dear —”

The pristine red one catches his eye almost immediately, and the deductions snap into place so fast it’s like breathing too much oxygen at one time. His mind has literally been rotting away, desperate for any kind of stimulation, that he pounces on the token thread with a malicious alacrity even by his standards.

“What do we have here?” Sherlock says scooping up the present before she has a chance to do so.

“Sherlock —” Molly says, eyes wide.

“I wouldn’t get too cosy, there Sheldon —” 

“It’s _Stephen.”_

“— It’s obvious Molly already has a boyfriend, and that she’s seeing him this very night, in fact.”

“Sherlock,” Jane says sharply.

But Sherlock is picking up steam now, the pieces slotting into place like the tumblers of a lock, and it’s all so crystal _clear._

“And it’s quite serious, too, judging by the gift you bought him,” he says, examining the package. “Surely you’ve all noticed the attention she’s given to this one in particular, whereas the others are slapdash at best. Perfectly creased corners, pretty bow, and a shade of red that echoes her lipstick. Whether or not that was a conscious decision on her part, the association in clear: our _Miss_ Molly Hooper has lurrrve on the mind.”

“ _Sher_ lock.”

Sherlock ignores Jane, and steps even closer to Molly, where she shifts in her too-tight Manolo Blahniks, an embarrassed flush creeping up her neck. He shoots _Stephen_ a look, thoroughly enjoying his poleaxed expression and what’s about to come. “The fact she’s serious about him is clear in that she is giving him a gift at all, you see. Semiotics 101. It’s evident she’s seeing him tonight from her makeup and what she’s wearing,” he fiddles with the gift tag, flipping it open, “False eyelashes, an exorbitant amount of eye shadow, shimmering lipstick and sparkling evening gown, blatant compensation for the size of her mouth and breasts…” and freezes dead in his tracks when he actually registers the name penned inside the innocent looking label.

_Dearest Sherlock,_  
_Merry Christmas._  
_Molly xxx_

“You – you always say such h-horrible things,” Molly says into the thunderclap of silence.

He swallows around the sudden tightness in his throat, and finally glances up. Her brown doe-like eyes brim with tears, lips trembling, and all at once white hot shame engulfs him. She heaves a breath. “Always.”

Molly’s shattered expression punches him in the chest, and suddenly it’s someone else’s face superimposed over hers, broken and betrayed, and horribly, horribly _hurt._

 _“You can’t just leave well enough alone, can you?”_ Jane had shouted at him, the pain and fury coming off of her in waves after he razed her to the ground with his deductions that day in the art gallery. It was something his own foolish hubris fell for time and time again, and it’s too similar that even Jane could realise the connection. To attempt to backpedal now would be just as disastrous, knowing his unrepentant callousness was what almost ended them.

Maybe he’s masochistic, but he forces himself to meet Jane’s gaze, prepared for the disappointment he knows he deserves. Instead, what he gets is…another unreadable mask. Which is ten times worse. He swallows through the sudden burning wanting nothing more than to turn away, escape to some quiet dark alley and —

He turns back to Molly. “I am sorry,” he says, unable to focus on anything but the gift in his hands. “Forgive me. Merry Christmas…Molly Hooper.” He smoothes down the bow, and kisses her on the cheek… 

“ _Unnh!”_

Sherlock’s gut squirms at the sound, because for whatever reason, the bloody universe has decided this moment isn’t bad enough.

“Oh!” Molly stammers, turning as crimson as Christmas tinsel. “That wasn’t me! I – I didn’t —”

Sherlock closes his eyes reaching for his pocket. “No, it was me.”

“My God, really?” Stephen gapes.

“It was my _phone,”_ Sherlock snaps, opening the new text message.

_Xx – 8:36 PM_  
_Mantelpiece._

“Fifty-seven,” Jane says quietly, and Sherlock jumps. He didn’t hear her sidling closer, probably due to the odd rushing noise in his ears.

“What?” Sherlock says. He spots a small red box with black bow sitting next to his skull, and his heart plummets.

“Fifty-seven text messages,” Jane repeats in a flat voice.

“Yeah,” he says, distracted, and manoeuvres around her towards the mantle. “Excuse me.”

The rushing in his ears increases ten-fold as he carries the small box back into his bedroom. The weight in correlation to its size only confirms the contents of the package, and opening it is only a detail.

Still, his hand shakes when he takes the black camera phone out of it tissue paper bedding, dread making it hard to think.

For a second, there is nothing but static in his head, and he lets it fill him up, reveling in the thundering blankness before the fallout that he knows is going to happen, happens.

He walks over to his window and with numb fingers dials a familiar number, forgoing the speed dial.

 _“Good lord. We’re not going to have Christmas phone calls now, are we? Have they passed a new law?”_ Mycroft says, and his typical disdain somewhat a relief in this surreal moment of his.

“You’re going to find Irene Adler tonight,” he says.

_“We already know where she is. And as you were so kind to point out, it hardly matters.”_

Sherlock closes his eyes. “No. I meant you’re going to find her dead.”

“Sherlock?” Jane says from his doorway, and Sherlock hangs up the phone. “Everything okay?”

He turns around, and the look on her face is more honest and open than he’s seen in a fortnight, concern etching its way around her eyes and mouth. It’s too much, and he clenches his hands into fists.

“Fine,” he says. She steps closer, and the scent of her clears the fog from his mind slightly. She smells like spices from the cider, and that almond bread she’s been helping Mrs. Hudson bake all day, and in this moment he feels closer to her than he has in a long while. His strings feel cut all of a sudden, and he leans his forehead against hers.

“Sherlock…?” she whispers, freezing for a moment, and he realises how this must be a mistake — a liberty he’s not longer privy to. He goes to pull away, but she stops him at the last second, a tentative hand smoothing up his chest to rest on the back of his neck.

“I have to — I want to —” he breaks off, not knowing what or how to say what needs to be said in order to repair the rift growing between them.

“What? Sherlock what is it?”

Before he can answer, his phone rings, and he squeezes his eyes shut, trying desperately to repress a shudder. Reluctantly, he pulls away, and answers.

“Mycroft.”

 _“Jane Doe brought into St. Mary’s earlier this evening. I’m having the body moved to St. Bartholomew’s,”_ Mycroft relays. _“No one has come forward to identify her.”_

He lets the information wash over him, his limbs growing cold. He tries to anchor himself with Jane’s warm gaze, the familiar bursts of gold and green rallying him somewhat. “I’ll be there.”

***

An hour later, he’s stood in the morgue staring down at a body covered with a stark white sheet.

“You didn’t have to come, Molly,” he says, willing his tongue to work around the bulky words.

“No, it’s fine,” she says playing with the hem of one of her familiar frumpy cat jumpers, the black dress and lipstick abandoned. “Everyone else was busy with…er, Christmas.” She clears her throat. “Now, just to warn you, the face is sort of bashed up so…”

She lowers the sheet, and the mottled swollenness and broken bones hardly register. At this point, this body could be anybody, and it would be foolish to jump to conclusions. (He doesn’t realise he’s holding his breath, and when he does he tries to let it out quietly through his nose. Mycroft, of course, still notices.)

“That’s her, isn’t it?” Mycroft asks, jolting him back to the present he seems to be trying so hard to retreat from.

“Show me the rest of her,” he says. Molly looks at him in confusion before folding the sheet back down below her knees. He lets his eyes rove clinically down the length of her body.

When she was standing there in front of him in that parlour, he forced himself to keep looking at her face. However, there was something he couldn’t help but notice —

— and there it is now. That peculiar birthmark shaped like a rose bud just left of her navel. (That’s it, then.)

“That’s her,” he says, and turns away, headed for the exit. Never has the morgue felt so oppressive before…so empty.

“Who is she? And how does Sherlock know her from…not her face?” he hears Molly ask just before the door shuts.

The corridor is dark and quiet, and the moon, shining silver through the window. He steps into the pool of light expecting it to feel as cold as it looks, but of course it doesn’t. The snow continues to fall outside, covering the ground in silence, glittering like stars under gas street lamps. It’s beautiful out there, but in here it’s ugly. He didn’t use to think so, but now he is on the other side of the table, as it were. He never imagined it, but he thinks he is supposed to feel something other that this buzzing numbness in his fingertips and a lead weight in his gut.

What does this mean, that the final link to his past — to who he used to be — is _gone?_ As existentially maudlin as it sounds, he wonders who this makes him now. 

Of all the death he’s witnessed and taken part of, never has he felt so directly responsible as he does now. Even in cases where he wasn’t quick enough or smart enough, he’d never felt like such an abject failure in the absence of someone else’s life. Maybe because from the moment he met Irene Trevor he recognised her for what she was: a _wealth_ of _potential._ And it was exciting for him in his youth to have some one absolutely _resonate_ right along with you. (And if he were to admit it, it was just as exciting seeing her again after all this time.) She is his compliment in every way.

Was. Christ.

“Here,” Mycroft says from behind him, a cigarette extended over his shoulder. He reaches to take it, but Mycroft holds it aloft. “Just the one, mind.”

“Why?” he says, and Mycroft finally hands it to him. 

“Merry Christmas?” he says, flicking on his lighter for him.

Sherlock faces him with a grunt, inhaling the sticky acrid smoke. The ashy burn feels wonderful, and ironically, he feels as if he can breathe for the first time since coming here.

“For what it’s worth —”

 _“Don’t,”_ he bites out, stopping _that_ dreadful conversation before it could manifest. 

Mycroft’s lips thin, and it’s clear he wants to say something more, but after a moment he inclines his head and taps out another cigarette for himself. He blows out a long smoking stream, absently picking a fleck of tobacco from his lip.

“Smoking indoors. Isn’t that one of those…law things?” Sherlock says when the silence begins to feel too smothering.

“We’re in a morgue, there’s only so much damage you can do,” he says, a grin hovering in the corner of his normally starched lips. All things considered, it’s as close to compassion as he gets. Sherlock turns away, not quite sure what to do with himself if Mycroft gets it into his head to _console_ him. Thankfully, Mycroft doesn’t attempt anything of the sort and instead asks, “How did you know she was dead?”

“There was an item in her possession, one she said her life depended on. She chose to give it up,” Sherlock says flicking ash against the window pane.

“And where is this item now?”

A murmur of voices sounds from further down the corridor, and the brothers turn their heads toward the noise. A couple stand in front of the viewing glass, their expressions visible through the sliver of window on the other side of the door. 

Sherlock can see the moment just before recognition: the desperate hope that who ever is under the cloth is a stranger, and the worst night of their lives need not happen this night of all nights. But indeed it is, and identical hopes are crushed, crumpling into visceral sorrow as they turn into one another, clinging to each other as their whole world shifts on its axis. A sob tears itself from the woman, its muffled echo bouncing off indifferent concrete walls while her husband sets his jaw attempting to remain stoic. She collapses under her grief, her mouth working around some sort of plea (a name?) too steeped in despair to be heard with any clarity.

Sherlock turns away before he can deduce anything more, automatically forcing his heart to stop its ridiculous, sympathetic staccato.

“Do you ever think something is wrong with us?” he asks, taking another healthy draught from his fag.

“Well it depends. Whose standards are you basing this on? Ours? Or _theirs?”_ Mycroft queries. “Look at them. They all care so much. It’s really a rather messy affair, don’t you think?”

“And you can live with that, can you?” asks Sherlock without rancour.

Mycroft shrugs. “All lives end. All hearts are broken. Caring is not an advantage, Sherlock.”

Sherlock turns back toward the peaceful world outside, and they spend the next few minutes in silence, staring out at the snow. Sherlock takes one last puff of cigarette, and looks down at it curiously.

“What ever happened to ‘low tar?’” he says, arching an eyebrow.

“Well…she was more than just an acquaintance, that woman. I thought the occasion called for it.”

Sherlock grunts again, and stubs it out against the steel grey wall. Without looking ‘round he makes his way to the exit, that utter coldness already creeping back into his bones.

“Merry Christmas, Mycroft,” he says, and pushes his way out into the silent night.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I also really apologise on how back logged on comments I am. I will try to respond to each and every one of you, and god bless you guys for your patience! <3


	11. Subsumed

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Heat rises, and Sherlock falls.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Eeep. Okay, here's the thing you guys. Some of you may have noticed the rating has changed, and some of you might be worried. Honestly this chapter is one of the reasons it's been taking me forever to get through this installment. I wanted to make sure I was a tasteful as possible, because I've said before I am really not a smut writer. But I changed the rating just in case for everybody's discretion. I hope you like it, and yes it is a bit angsty, but I promise these two will get their shit together soon. (And so will I lol)
> 
> So without further ado...
> 
> xxHoney

* * *

Jane’s phone rings, and with a heavy sigh, she answers it.

“Mycroft.”

_“He’s on his way. Did you find anything?”_

“No. Did he take the cigarette?” she asks.

_“Yes.”_

“Shit.”

“There’s nothing in the bedroom,” Mrs. Hudson confirms entering the kitchen where Jane is leaning against the table.

“Are you sure tonight’s a ‘danger night?’” she asks.

_“No, but then again I never am. You have to stay with him, Jane.”_

“Funny, that’s not the tune you’ve been singing lately,” she says bitterly. It’s frustrating because she doesn’t know what transpired between the brothers aside from a vague text and worrisome code phrase, however there is a very good chance it was Mycroft that upset him more than anything else. Which just makes her job _loads_ easier.

 _“Stay with him,”_ he repeats tersely, before ringing off.

“Mycroft…?” She is greeted with silence, and with an irritated huff, she slams her phone down onto the table. She runs her hands through her tangled hair and tries not to scream in frustration.

“Anything I can do?”

Startled she whips around where Stephen is hovering in the door way. “Oh, Stephen, god I’m sorry,” she says chagrined she forgot he was still here.

He gives her a rueful grin, adjusting his glasses. “Nothing to be sorry about. Can’t say I’ve ever been to a Christmas party quite like this one.”

“Er…yeah. Again, sorry.”

“Don’t be,” he says rubbing the back of his neck. “I appreciate it though. What you were trying to do.” At this he looks at her shrewdly, and she bites her lip.

“Caught that did you?” she asks, and he laughs shaking his head.

“You clearly told me the wrong time for the party. It was a bit obvious when I showed up exactly when she did,” he teases.

“Hey, I’m not going to apologise for that. I think you and Molly would be smashing together. I knew she was working, and hated the idea of her feeling awkward the whole night for showing up late. You would have never seen her relaxed and loose otherwise. Well…not without a few Peppermint Schnapps in her,” Jane says, then pinches her lips together when she realises she’s rambling.

“Well. Thank you all the same,” Stephen says, inclining his head like the gracious gentleman that his is. He shakes out his jacket and slips it on.

“Wait, are you —? You _are_ going to call her, right?” Jane says, seeing him to the door.

He slowly pulls on his gloves, a thoughtful expression on his kind face. “It’s a nice thought, but…” he looks up at her, “I’ve learned early on not to compete with Sherlock Holmes.”

“Stephen…” she says, but he quiets her with a kiss to her cheek.

“Merry Christmas, Jane,” he says, and heads down the creaky stairs. Jane touches her fingertips to her cheek.

“Merry Christmas,” she says softly to the empty flat. Or almost empty.

“Oh, that kind boy forgot to take some afters with him,” Mrs. Hudson tsks, holding a plate covered in tin foil. She huffs a sad sigh. “Ah well. Hopefully he’s buttoned up; it’s snowing like the dickens out there.”

“Yeah,” she agrees, knowing they are both talking about someone else.

“He’ll be all right, I’m sure of it,” Mrs. Hudson says giving her hand a sympathetic squeeze. Jane smiles, and gives her landlady a fervent hug. She helps her carry down her roaster, and stays for the obligatory cup of tea, all the while listening with half an ear for the front door while Mrs. Hudson chatters about nothing at all. When it’s apparent she’s lingered long enough, she bids her goodnight, and makes the reluctant trek up to an empty flat.

She looks around the sitting room, a despondent feeling settling around her like a cloak, every ounce of cheer from earlier vanishing at the sight of the lonely tableau before her. The wind howls balefully through the panes causing the glass to wail and rattle, and it is still too quiet. 

“Wine,” she says with a nod, and heads in the direction of the kitchen.

She’s on her second glass, when a thunderous _bang_ makes her jump sky high. She drops the glass with a crash and runs out into the sitting room where the windows have blown inward in the gale.

The fairy lights are hanging by their last measly thumbtack, lashing back and forth in a tangled whip, and Sherlock’s music stand has toppled over, sheet music billowing around the room in one beautiful moment of absolute chaos. She can do nothing but stare at the literal manifestation of the swirling mess inside of her, reveling in the stinging cold biting her cheeks before she springs into action, heaving one of the windows closed with a yell.

When she reaches for the other one, however, her hand slips causing the metal window latch to tear into her palm. She curses, clutching her arm to her chest, shivering in the frosty air.

With one hand she takes hold of the window and heaves it closed, but before she can try and get the other side, it’s already being secured shut by a dark figure in a long coat.

“Sherlock?” she says, dizzy from the wind, her eyes straining to see him in the dimness.

“Christ,” he mutters, facing her. He smells like the city — that sharp smell of cigarette smoke and London winter. It makes her heart pound, and she hisses in pain when her palm starts to throb. “Why is there blood on the window?” He grips her elbow, and she’s embarrassed to find that her knees turn a little wobbly at his touch.

God, it’s been so long since she felt like she could just _lean_ into him and —

“Jane?” Sherlock says, gripping her more firmly as she teeters.

She shakes her head, berating herself for being ridiculous. “Wine,” she mumbles to herself, straightening. Then in a voice she hopes is steady: “Power must have gone out.”

Sherlock makes a noise of agreement in the back of his throat. He hesitates for a second before pulling her over to his armchair, making her sit. Feeling a little foolish, she just sits there, dazed, while he rummages around for a torch and something to start the fire up again. Soon, he has the flames crackling brightly in the grate, and the sitting room is illuminated in soft orange light.

Her eyes rove over the side of his face, his intense concentration bent to the task of banking the fire. He looks much too pale, even in this light.

“Where did you go?” she asks, and he stiffens.

“Morgue,” he says brusquely, reaching for something at the foot of the armchair — a small first aid kit, one of many they have scattered around the flat for occasions such as these.

“That was four hours ago,” she says, letting him look at her hand. “Where have you been?”

“Walking,” he says, jaw clenching.

“In the storm?”

“Well I had to give you lot time to search my stuff, didn’t I?” he snaps, eyes flashing. She refuses to feel guilty.

“I was worried. Mycroft called, can you blame me?” she volleys. He scowls, but doesn’t answer, and instead tends to the cut on her palm. She suffers the disinfectant in stoic silence. She can’t explain it, but she’s suddenly annoyed with the whole thing. “So what was so important that his Royal Wideness needed you to come down to the morgue? Not to mention dragging Molly out with you, which was incredibly inconsiderate by the way.”

Sherlock doesn’t look up, but he pauses for a second. “There was a body that needed to be identified,” he says in an odd muted tone. He continues to unwrap a plaster, pressing it to her skin.

“Obviously,” she snorts, but still he doesn’t meet her eyes. He smoothes his fingers over the bandage, a methodic brush back and forth. “So are you going to tell me what this was all about, then?”

The brushing stops, the pads of his fingers resting on the delicate skin of her wrist. “Irene Adler,” he says.

“W…Adler? What does she have to do with anything?” Jane says, confused. She was supposed to be long gone off in Normandy or something.

He looks up at her then, blinking hard a few times before his eyes glaze over somewhat. “It was her. Her body.”

 _“What?”_ Jane says, horrified. Sherlock closes his eyes.

“Don’t make me say it again,” he says, fingers tightening around her wrist. “Please.”

Jane’s heart clenches, and she suddenly feels so helpless. Is there anything she can even say at this point? “Oh, Sherlock…”

“She – she left me her phone. Her insurance policy,” he scoffs, a sharp jagged sound. “I just… _why_ didn’t she come to me sooner, Jane? God.” He looks up at her, finally, his eyes shrouded by the devastation written across his face. She cups his cheek, and he releases a harsh laugh, hand flying up to cover hers. _“God,”_ he repeats, breath coming faster and faster.

“Shh, love. Breathe,” she says, cradling his face in both hands now. He devolves into hyperventilating, and she urges him to his feet. He clings to her, and she helps him into the kitchen where he leans raggedly against the counter, hand frantically clawing at his coat and scarf. “Shh,” she says again, helping him out of his constricting clothes. In the dim light from the sitting room, she locates a flannel and runs it under the cool water. She folds it and places it on the nape of his neck, other hand back to caressing his cheek.

He grips her desperately, one hand fisted in the back of her shirt, and the other back around her wrist. “Jane,” he croaks.

“I’m here,” she murmurs. “Just breathe, Sherlock.” He nods, gulping in huge draughts of air.

“I d-don’t know why this is h-happening,” he grits out, a dry sob getting caught in between panicked bursts of air.

Jane sighs, turning the flannel to the cool side. He shudders visibly, closing his eyes. “It’s because…you care for her, Sherlock.”

“I — I —”

“It’s okay. You get that right? It’s okay that you love…loved her,” Jane says voice hitching over the truth of the words. She lets the pain in only for a moment. It’s all she’ll allow herself.

Sherlock gasps, suddenly crushing her to himself in a fervid embrace. _“Jane.”_

She drops the flannel, arms wrapping around him, fingers tangling in his hair when he buries his face in her neck.

“Tell me what to do, Sherlock,” Jane says, looking toward the ceiling for answers she doesn’t have. He shakes his head against her, and she swallows roughly. The pain is so visceral, she can feel it pouring off of him in droves, and she would give anything, _anything_ to fix it. She grasps his hair pulling his head up so he can focus on her words. “Tell me what you need.”

* * *

Jane’s fingers curled snug against his scalp (sharp, cool, soft, calloused) stop the twisting feeling in his lungs, and he moans as bright spots of light streak across his vision. His head pounds briefly from lack of oxygen, the sensation of breathing almost too much. He lets himself be locked in her solid grip, relishing the unyielding tension preventing him from shaking apart. He reaches up with one hand, and covers her own, encouraging her to grip tighter and tighter and — _oh_ that is a sensation, isn’t it?

Finally, his diaphragm no longer seems to be working against him, and his breathing finds its rhythm. 

“What do you need?” Jane whispers again, her expression earnest, her eyes so clear he’s reminded of the rock pools he visited in Cornwall when he was a child — transparent and still like glass and _so full_ of teeming life and colour. _Incandescent._ Instead of answering, he crushes his lips to hers.

She stiffens in shock, and Sherlock tries to pull away, he really does, but the feel of her soft lips, and compact body against his is what he’s been utterly _craving_ for so long.

Jane resists for a second more before she all but melts against him, going soft all over. He cups the pliant arch of her beautiful neck, fingertips curling around the downy hairs at her nape causing her to gasp when he tugs lightly. It’s a delightful sound, one that he wants to drink in like rain in the desert — the humid smell of petrichor filling his lungs and clinging to his skin.

He wants to _devour_ her.

Without breaking the kiss, he spins her around and lifts her up onto the counter. She makes a noise of surprise that he catches in his mouth, his hands roving atop her thighs to her waist, and then back again.

“Sherlock,” she whispers against his lips, blunt nails digging into his shoulders. He growls low in his throat, and she shivers.

He gets his hands under her jumper, and she helps him pull off the thick material. The tee shirt underneath is already damp at the small of her back, the heat from the fire warming their small flat rather thoroughly. He presses his nose to the light sheen of sweat at the hollow of her throat and inhales the scent of her at its most concentrated. He can’t help himself from lipping at her collar bone, tasting tentatively. She murmurs softly, wrapping her legs around his waist, and suddenly they aren’t nearly close enough. He gathers her to him, scooping her up, and in silent agreement they make their way to his bedroom, kissing all the while.

He sets her down, pressing her into the wall beside his door, his hand tangling in her soft hair. She fumbles with the buttons of his shirt in the dark, huffing when Sherlock does little to help her. He’s completely unrepentant, however, preoccupied as he is with the soft spot behind her ear. Her scent is even stronger here, and it is a heady combination of her rosemary mint shampoo with a hint of that maddening apple blossom. He doesn’t know if he shivers due to her intoxicating presence, or due to the fact he is now sans shirt in the chill air of his room. He inhales sharply when she runs her warm hands over his chest, and he pulls away, blinking owlishly at her.

In an unspoken question he fingers the hem of her tee shirt, brushing the smooth skin of her belly which makes her tremble. She takes his hands and leads him to the bed where he sits on the edge.

Jane draws back with a kiss to his lips and cheek, and stands straight and striking in the slant of moonlight through the window. Her lambent eyes smoulder into his as she slips her thumbs into the waistband of her jeans, unfastening the button. He watches her intently, tracing the bend of her spine as she lowers them to the floor and steps out of them. She smiles self-consciously, hesitating a moment before lifting her shirt over her head.

Her right hand immediately comes up to cover her left shoulder, fiddling nervously with the strap of black lace against her collar bone. At the sight of her insecurity, Sherlock can’t _not_ go to her.

He surges up from the bed, cupping her face and touching their foreheads together. Jane shudders out a breath, and he gently takes her hand lowering it from the pucker of skin that makes up her **scar.** He replaces her fingers with his, tracing the starburst edge in awe. She sucks in a breath, her brow furrowing.

 _“You…”_ Sherlock says, but words fail him at the sight and feel of her. She breathes in steadily through her nose, reaching for the clasp behind her. Another layer falls away like a rose petal, and he almost can’t breathe from how beautiful she is. He enfolds her tenderly in his arms, reveling in the feel of her wonderfully fragrant skin against his.

“Sherlock. Love,” Jane whispers, trembling under the onslaught of his exploration as he tastes the place where the bullet pierced her. He clutches at her waist, feeling another ridge of scarring from her rib across to her hip, but before he can deduce the particulars Jane rakes her fingernails down his spine causing something in him to snap.

He pulls her flush to his body, and their kisses grow frenzied with tongues and teeth, and Sherlock can’t seem to make up his mind whether he wants to continue kissing her mouth, or other parts of her tempting skin.

Somehow they end up tangled on the bed, fingers roaming, legs twining around each other.

Somehow the rest of their clothes are removed as they unwrap each other with eager impatience.

Somehow words cease to have meaning, the only language that matters is that in grasping hands and wayward kisses.

Ebb and flow. Rise and fall. Push and pull, give and take, take, _take._

Hot breath, damp skin, the taste of salt, and _more._

He wants to subsume her and everything she has. Everything she is.

He wants to be her air, her marrow, the delicate sweat between her breasts, the eyelash on her cheek.

He wants to lay devastation to her, leave nothing left.

…Because he is — and always has been — hollow.

And when they lay replete, gasping for breath and aching from the pouring out of one another, it is still not enough for him.

He still must entangle their limbs, and fuse their heartbeats. Cage them together even as she falls gently into sleep. Fight his own weariness because he knows the garishness of day will come, shedding its stark light on him. On his freakish emptiness.

In the morning Jane will see this — him — and she will recoil. And when she does, she will leave eventually, there is no question. Everyone always has.

Bitter regret threatens to choke him, and fear keeps his eyes rigidly open, his heart hammering against Jane’s back so hard he’s afraid he’ll wake her.

He doesn’t sleep.

He doesn’t let go of her for a long, long time.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Since this is new territory for me, (relatively) comments on this chapter are especially welcome!


	12. Convoluted Significance

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jane goes home for Boxing Day, and Sherlock attempts to examine some truths.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Guys! A chapter! What is this madness? Lol. As some of you may know, I have been extremely busy with school lately, and I apologise for making you think this story was abandoned. I cannot quite promise any sort of regularity on updates, but just know that I am still working on this as well as my other stories. You all are beautiful.
> 
> xxHoney

* * *

There isn’t a morning after.

Because, really, they wouldn’t be them if there were.

Instead, there is self recrimination in the middle of the night so strong it wakes Jane up from a dreamless slumber.

She can feel when Sherlock discovers she’s no longer sleeping, going deadly still all over aside from his heart, pounding like a snared rabbit. He shifts his arm from its place across her chest, as if to remove it, but she holds fast to his wrist.

“Don’t,” she says into the dark. He freezes, not daring to even breathe, which is fine, because she’s breathing for the both of them. She heaves. “Don’t do this.”

Before he has a chance to answer her, or god forbid leave, she flips around and wraps her arms around him, her head under his chin, and her leg in between his like a vine.

“You cannot do this. All right? You cannot hate yourself,” she says fiercely. “If you want me to, I will go, and we can go back to – to where it never happened.” She lifts her head, attempting to distinguish something, anything, from his expression in the dark. “But you are… _not allowed_ to tear yourself apart.”

He doesn’t say anything, but she can hear him swallowing, his throat clicking in the conflicted silence. She takes a shaking hand and caresses his face, feeling his furrowed brow, and the tension in his jaw. “I know.” She places a small kiss to the corner of his mouth before quietly extracting herself. 

She gathers her clothes as best she can, and hurries back to the safety of her room, steeling herself against the stark emptiness of her own bed.

Sleep, when it does come, is a restless one, and she wakes much too early, tracking the dawn light across her bedroom walls as the sun continues to rise. 

She knows she should probably get out of bed, but the sound of a mournful violin makes her lose her nerve. She knows she should say something, anything, before she leaves for Surrey to see her mother and sister, but she has no words that could possibly fix it. Fix them.

God, everything is so fucked.

She leaves with an awkward smile, and a reminder for Sherlock to eat while she’s away, her gut twisting at the farce of it all. He merely nods in response, still pulling his bow back and forth across the strings, and Jane tries, and fails, not to worry.

She frets on the train ride all the way to Surrey, glancing from time to time at her phone which remains stubbornly silent. The only upside is that her mother and her sister have come to get her from the train station, and they seem to be getting along with each other, which is a small mercy. Despite how at odds she is with her family, there is still a comfort to being crushed in her mother's warm embrace.

“My lovely Janette, oh!” Celeste Watson says, voice already going a bit teary. “It's been too long, sweetheart. Too long.”

“I was just here this summer,” Jane chuckles, squeezing back.

“Let me look at you. Mm. A bit peaky, darling. Have you been eating properly?”

“Yes,” Jane says, rolling her eyes. She catches her sister's cheeky smirk, and grins.

“Good to see you, Janey,” Harry says, kissing her on the cheek. Jane grasps her elbow, squeezing it. Her sister looks good, healthy, a bright glow to her cheeks Jane hasn't seen since — oh. _Clara._ Jane doesn't need to be a detective to see that they are clearly back together.

“Yeah. You too,” Jane says, swallowing around the sudden tightness in her throat,. She doesn't know if it's from jealously or self-pity, but whatever the case, Jane can't bear to look at her sister for long. Her gaze slides away the moment her sister's eyes narrow, and Jane hopes she hasn't given herself away.

At Harry's suspicious glance a moment later, she sees she hasn't been successful. In the cab on the way to Weybridge, Jane has never been so grateful for their mother's idle chatter, if only because it prevents her sister from pressing the issue.

When the white house with the country shutters comes into view, Jane is rather overwhelmed with the nostalgia of it all., and takes a moment to gather herself before she gets out of the taxi. She rubs her knuckles over her sternum, trying to dispel the strange ache in her chest.

Taking a breath, she tacks on a smile, and follows her mother and her sister into the house. Given how disastrous last Christmas was, it's no wonder Jane feels a nervous flutter in her gut when the door closes behind her, and she is instantly swept up in a good old fashioned Watson Family Boxing Day.

Several of her uncles are already in the den watching a match on the telly, and occasionally, the back door to the yard bangs open and shut as some of her much younger cousins run in and out of the house, chasing each other with their new toys. Her mother's book club is also there, the four of them having taken over the kitchen where the smell of something delicious is cooking, the gossip ceasing just long enough to yell their fussy greetings out to Jane when her mother announces her presence.

“Come on, Janey,” Harry says before the busybodies can start in on her with their prying, inane questions. “I'll show you where you'll be sleeping. I'm afraid your old room's been commandeered by the little savages.”

Jane nods gratefully, and follows her sister upstairs to the attic bedroom.

Harry yanks hard on the chain in the ceiling, and the stairs come tumbling out, the safety catch long since broken. Jane is at the ready, though, and she catches them before they slide out and whack anybody. It's a two person job, these stairs, and Harry and Jane grin at each other, no doubt remembering the time when they were kids and the stairs hit Harry square in the face, busting her retainer and cutting her lip something awful.

“I can't believe these are still broken,” Jane remarks, lowering the creaky ladder contraption to the floor.

“Yeah, Dad never got around to fixing them,” Harry says. Talking about their dad doesn't hurt like it used to, but it still leaves the echo of an ache, and a peculiar vacuum behind. The following silence is a little awkward, but Jane finds she doesn't mind so much. “Go on up, I'll hand you your things,” Harry says, nodding at the stairs.

Jane does as she's told, putting an inordinate amount of faith in the rickety thing under her, trying her best to ignore its alarming groans of protest. Once she's up, she turns around to receive the hold-all and suitcase, followed by a helpfully placed hand for her sister to haul herself up.

She tosses her stuff on the foot of the narrow bed, the wrought iron frame giving a cranky wail when she flops inelegantly on the thin mattress. Harry walks over to the narrow window, and fluffs out the pink checkered curtains, coughing when a cloud of dust billows out between the folds, making Jane laugh.

“Shut up!” Harry says between her sputtering, wiping her eyes. She pulls up an antique, leather trunk and sits on it across from Jane. Their giggling tapers off, and Jane looks around the room. Harry wipes her palms on her jeans. “So...”

“So,” Jane says awkwardly. Her sister narrows her eyes, and Jane only returns her stare as expressionless as she can.

“Cut the shit, Janette,” Harry says with a knowing arch of her eyebrow.

“What ever do you mean, Harriet?” she says, trying to return the banter, but it falls remarkably flat. She looks down at her fingers, picks at the hem of her jumper, hoping Harry will just leave it.

Her hope is in vain.

“How's Sherlock?”

“Fine,” she answers, a bit too fast. Harry's eyebrows fly up.

“Really? Because I find it hard to believe you deigned to stay in Surrey all the way until New Year's simply because you missed us _all so much.”_

“What is that supposed to mean?”

“It means, you only come out here when you're running away from —”

“Running away!”

“Yes, running away,” Harry interrupts. “You hate it here. Don't pretend you've come back out of familial obligation. Ever since you shacked up with Holmes —”

“This is ridiculous,” Jane says angrily, getting to her feet and walking over to the window.

“— it's clear he's the only place you ever want to be!” Harry finishes triumphantly, and Jane stills.

She clenches her left fist, feeling the tremor that wants to break free, and trying to tamp it down. “God, you're such a bitch sometimes, Harry.”

“I'm right, though,” Harry says, ignoring the insult and coming over to join her, leaning her shoulder likewise against the opposite pane. She ducks her head, trying to catch Jane's eye. Then in a softer voice, “What happened, Janey?”

Jane blinks hard, staring outside where a few of her younger cousins are chasing each other on the back lawn, her breath fogging the glass as she attempts to breathe out evenly.

“I messed up, Harry.”

“What do you mean?”

Jane looks at her. “Sherlock...he. He doesn't do sentiment. I think I pushed him too hard; took us to a place I'm not sure we were ready to go, yet.” Her sister nods her understanding, urging her to continue. Jane takes a breath, wobbling on that precipice for half a second before she pours everything out. “The thing is, though. The thing is — I wouldn't take back being with him, not for anything, and that makes me a selfish person because it's very possible he's still in love with someone who's dead, and part of me is fucking jealous, and then guilty for being jealous, like I used his grief to my advantage somehow. And yet, another part of me can't contain this indecent happiness I feel whenever I think about it. Whenever I remember...

“Because, I love him, Harry. I love him so much, but who am I, really? I'm not that smart or special, and if anything, he'll get bored of me eventually. His brother seems to think it's the other way 'round — that _I'll_ be the one to get tired of him — as if Sherlock is nothing but a stopgap before I settle down with an ordinary husband and an ordinary picket-fence life.” She scoffs. “No, he's dead wrong about that. If — when. When Sherlock leaves, it'll be me picking up the pieces, and the funny thing is, I know this perfectly well and yet I don't care. Because, you're right, Harry. He is the only place I ever want to be, and I will hold on to that for as long as I can. It's mad, and self-destructive, and I absolutely don't. bloody. care.”

By the time her tirade is finished, Jane has to swipe at her eyes, furious with herself and silently daring her sister to tell her she's right — it is destructive and a bit not good and what the hell is Jane doing — but instead, Harry huffs out a breath, her tongue thoughtfully touching her upper lip as she looks at her.

“It sounds like you could use to get bloody shit-faced, mate.”

A laugh is startled out of Jane, not entirely unwelcome, because it is so Harry, and the suggestion is simultaneously the first and last thing she wants to do in that moment. She closes her eyes and shakes her head, trying to tamp down on the sudden tears that resurface.

“That's your response to everything,” she says.

“Well...yes. Although, not so much advice for myself anymore,” Harry says, eyes sliding away almost bashfully. Jane's eyebrows lift. “Been sober for four months now.”

Jane regards her knowingly, trying and failing to hold back the beaming smile that belies her nonchalance. “Clara?”

Harry's return smile is radiant. “Yeah. We hashed some things out, and were honest with ourselves and each other. I told her that I wanted to...leave my old life behind once and for all, and didn't tell her about my meetings until I had been at least thirty days clean. Both of us want to start a family,” she says lifting a shoulder. “Clara can't, and I'm not getting any younger so —”

Jane all but tackles her in a rib-crushing hug, making Harry laugh and wrap her arms around her tight. After a moment, Jane holds her out at arms length getting a good look at her sister. “Holy shit, Harry. God, I'm so happy for you. Does Mum know?”

“Yeah. I told her our plans yesterday. We both did. Clara had to leave early this morning back to Leeds to sort a few things, but then she and I are moving. Possibly to London, if everything works out.”

“I'm...” Jane clears her throat, overcome for a moment with joy tinged with a bit of sadness and longing. It's like adding that pinch of salt to something sweet, the sharpness making it all the more prevalent. “I'm really proud of you, Harriet.”

Harry cocks her head. Jane doesn't know what her face is doing at the moment, but it apparently warrants some big-sisterly concern. “Hey now,” she says, tucking a strand of Jane's hair behind her ear. “You're going to make me cry, coming over all Hallmark.”

Jane laughs at the northern lilt to Harry's accent, harkening back to Clara's familiar Yorkshire brogue. It warms her heart to hear, and her grin makes her cheeks ache. “Well, given I'm going to be an Auntie, you'd better get me that drink you mentioned.”

* * *

Quiet. 

Baker Street is terribly quiet. Even the cars on the road are few and far between, driving slowly in some ridiculous attempt at 3 A.M. consideration, lending a dreary silence to the whole street. The knowledge that even Mrs. Hudson is away visiting her sister makes the emptiness worse somehow. At least with her incessant prattling there was something to occasionally interrupt his brain from its constant cycling.

As it is, Sherlock doesn't know how long he's been laying on the sofa, hands steepled under his chin while his mind tears itself apart. It's too quiet, and the criminals in London are being dull, and Jane is away. 

It's intolerable. Even talking out loud to her doesn't help. (Mostly because he doesn't really feel much like talking.)

Jane thinks he's in mourning over Irene. Which given how he handled everything, (panic; such a base and absurd reaction, and what had followed was decidedly in the realm of Not Good) he supposes it's not entirely unfounded. But he's not. In mourning.

True, he does regret the loss of her potential; a mind such as hers is a rare thing, and it is a waste for it to end up on Molly's slab just like so many _ordinary_ people before her. The injustice of it angers him somewhat. However, that isn't what's eating at him.

It is the sudden and total loss of control over the situation that threw him. And then on top of that, the trainwreck of his past spilling into his present, disturbing the neat order of his Mind Palace when things are already in disarray. Simply, how is he to deal with all of these... _feelings_ when he is still trying to reconcile this shift in paradigm.

Jane.

It's always Jane. 

Her presence in his Mind Palace seeps through the walls and into crevices, her voice in his rafters, her unique fragrance perfuming his halls. The way he makes decisions, the way he looks at facts, and the way he looks at himself. Because of Jane, he can no longer call himself a sociopath.

She is like the sun pouring in from those grand skylights in his mind, and even if he wanted to board them up, he knows the warmth would still find its way in through the cracks, making him incapable of being cold ever again.

He is forced to recognise, and integrate this newness of feeling, and in the small hours of the morning he can actually be honest with himself and say that there is in fact genuine _remorse_ for Irene Adler, if only due to hers being a life that needn't have been lost.

He huffs a breath, irritated with himself at these maudlin thoughts, absently scratching at his temple where, unbeknownst to him, a single tear has traced its way into his hairline.

It isn't easy to admit to the existence of his heart, but given the way its been banging against his bones lately, it can't (won't) be ignored.

Sherlock glances over to the desk, eyeing the object of his irony: a model of a real human heart, (enlarged due to amyloidosis) bisected and preserved in plasticine, mounted on a modest stand. It was meant for Jane, the hideous Christmas bow still stuck to it, the shiny material crumpled and slightly lopsided. He purchased it before the start of the case, tucking it away in his wardrobe where he promptly forgot all about it until these revolving thoughts of metaphorical hearts reminded him.

He sighs, and heaves himself off the sofa. For now, Jane's heart will find its home on the mantle next to Sherlock's skull. They look good there together, balanced almost — the juxtaposition of head and heart supremely apt in that moment — and when Sherlock notices the (once again maudlin) symbolism, he barely refrains from rolling his eyes lest he sprain something from the force of it.

He scowls around the sitting room, arms crossed tightly over his chest, glaring at the flat as if it's to blame for his foolishness. His eyes settle on Jane's laptop, hesitating only a second before he takes a seat at the desk and opens the lid.

As is his habit since summer, Sherlock takes to re-reading Jane's blog when ever she's gone for extended periods of time. Because as much as he scoffs at her romantic style of writing, in truth, her words are highly expressive and when he reads them, it's almost like he can hear her voice right there in the room. It's a comfort he wouldn't dare admit to anyone. (Although he suspects Mrs. Hudson knows.)

He's in the middle of re-reading the (highly redacted version) of the Tilly Briggs case, when something catches his eye. Jane's got one of the facts wrong about the cruise ship. She keeps referring to the observation deck as the bridge, and by the third time she's done it, Sherlock has to physically stop his left eye from twitching. Surely she won't mind if he just goes in and changes it. After all, he'd be saving her from sounding like an idiot. 

Yes, even she would overlook this breach in privacy given the cause, so he'll just pop in and —

Funny. She seems to have changed her password. It will probably only take three minutes (five at the most) to crack it. It's laughable, really, how she can thinks she can keep him out —

No matter. Process of elimination dictates that —

Sherlock blinks hard at the screen when it dares to tell him he's failed to hack into Jane's blog. He used his three attempts, and now the login screen teases him with the words _ERROR — ACCOUNT LOCKED_ and some other information on customer service and password retrieval.

He supposes he could go through her email and reset it somehow, but if he does that, he won't know what her password is. And now this password has become the whole point, because a password of Jane Watson's that _Sherlock_ can't crack is infinitely more intriguing.

Passwords are very telling. As common sense would dictate, the level of security is directly correlated to the importance of the information the password is guarding. Concurrently, in order to remember these often times more convoluted passwords, people tend to think attributing some sort of sentimental significance specific to their intimate lives is clever, and harder to guess, when in fact, the most secure password is just the opposite. Assigning something meaningless, while harder to remember (for some people), is a hundred times harder to deduce. However, the former is more common due to the tenability of associative thinking.

Which is why Jane's elusive password is such a puzzle. It's her nature to relate anything to everything, often making leaps in logic that are farfetched and esoteric even by Sherlock's standards. For instance, there was one memorable occasion where both of them were hunkered over a corpse when Jane suddenly declared they were out of peanut butter at the flat, and when Sherlock asked her how that was at all relevant, she simply shrugged and said that the dead man's shoes reminded her. It was mystifying. (And to his dark amusement, wonderfully appalling.)

No, Jane's password wouldn't be something random. Knowing her, it had some significant meaning, moreso than the contents it guarded.

He glances at the desk drawer where The Woman's camera phone lies.

It seems to be a theme lately, and he doesn't miss the parallels between the two. He goes to take the phone out of the drawer, when he stops, fingers hovering over the polished knob.

After a moment, he pulls his hand back, and draws both of them up to their customary prayer position under his chin.

As frustrating as these two mysteries are, Sherlock can't help but be grateful for the way they fill the silence in the flat, making this endless night a little more tolerable.

He sits there, thinking until the sun comes up, and if his eyes wander back to the familiar words on Jane's blog, well. Even he doesn't begrudge himself.


End file.
